'^/^.S2j
THE REMINISCENCES
OF AN
IRISH LAND AGENT
THE REMINISCENCES
OF AN
IRISH LAND AGENT
BEING THOSE OF
S. M. HUSSEY
Compiled by
HOME GORDON
WITH TWO PORTRAITS
LONDON
DUCKWORTH <^ND COM'P<iANY
3 HENRIETTA STREET, W.C.
1904
'^10
. Ir66
Edinburgh : T. and A. Constable, Printers to His Majesty
PREFACE
Probably the first criticism on this book will be that it
is colloquial.
The reason for this lies in the fact that though Mr. Hussey
has for two generations been one of the most noted racon-
teurs in Ireland, he has never been addicted to writing,
and for that reason has always declined to arrange his
memoirs, though several times approached by publishers
and strongly urged to do so by his friends, notably Mr.
Froude and Mr. John Bright. If his reminiscences are to
be at all characteristic they must be conversational, and it
is as a talker that he himself at length consents to appear
in print.
In this volume he endeavours to supply some view of
his own country as it has impressed itself on ' the most
abused man in Ireland,' as Lord James of Hereford charac-
terised Mr. Hussey. How little practical effect several
attacks on his life and scores of threatening letters have had
on him is shown by the fact that he survives at the age
of eighty to express the wish that his recollections may open
the eyes of many as well as prove diverting.
Possessing a retentive memory, he has been further
vi REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
able to assist me with seven large volumes of newspaper
cuttings which he had collected since 1853, while the
publishers kindly permit the use of two articles he con-
tributed to Murray's Magazine in May and July 1887.
To me the preparation of this book has been a delightful
task, materially helped by Mr. Hussey's family as well as
by a few others on either side of the Channel.
HOME GORDON.
13 OviNGTON Square, S.W.
CONTENTS
PREFACE, ......
CHAP.
I. ANCESTRY, ....
II. PARENTAGE AND EARLY YEARS,
III. EDUCATION, .
IV. FARMING,
V. LAND AGENT IN CORK,
VL FAMINE AND FEVER,
VII. FENIANISM,
VIII. MYSELF, SOME FACTS, AND MANY STORIES,
IX. THE HARENC ESTATE,
X. KERRY ELECTIONS, ....
XL DRINK, ....
XII. PRIESTS, ......
XIIL CONSTABULARY AND DISPENSARY DOCTORS,
XIV. IRISH CHARACTERISTICS, ....
XV. LORD-LIEUTENANTS AND CHIEF SECRETARIES,
XVI. GLADSTONIAN LEGISLATION,
PAGE
V
30
38
SO
60
71
82
93
lOI
127
140
162
179
viii REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
XVII. THE STATE OF KERRY,
XVIII. A GLANCE AT MY STEWARDSHIP,
XIX. MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME,
XX. THE EDENBURN OUTRAGE,
XXI. MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES,
XXII. COMMISSIONS, . . . . .
XXIII. LATER DAYS,
INDEX,
PAGE
194.
202
212
235
248
268
281
305
ILLUSTRATIONS
PORTRAIT OF S. M. HUSSEY
PORTRAIT OF MRS. HUSSEY
frontispiece
at p. 71
REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH
LAND AGENT
CHAPTER I
ANCESTRY
' My father and mother were both Kerry men,' as the saying
goes in my native land, and better never stepped.
It was my misfortune, but not my fault, that I was born
at Bath and not in Kerry.
However, my earliest recollection is of Dingle, for I was
only three months old when I was taken back to Ireland, and
up to that time I did not study the English question very
deeply, especially as I had an Irish nurse.
There is a lot of Hussey history before I was born, and
some is worth preserving here.
It is a thousand pities that so many details of family
history have been lost, and to my mind it is incumbent on
one member of every reasonably old family in this generation
to collect and set down what should be remembered about
their ancestors for the unborn to come.
My contribution does not profess to be very exhaustive,
but it will serve for want of a better.
When a man claims to be descended from Irish kings, it
generally means that his forbears were bigger scoundrels than
he is, for they were cattle-lifters and marauders, whilst his
A
2 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
depredations are probably disguised under some of the many-
insidious forms of finance. Just as every Scotsman is not
canny and every American is not cute, so every Irishman is
not what the Saxon believes him to be. But there can be
little doubt what type of men these ancient Irish sovereigns
were, and I regretfully confess I cannot trace my descent
from them.
The family of Hussey was of English extraction, according
to that rather valuable book 'The Antient and Present State of
the County of Kerry ^ by Charles Smith, 1756 — the companion
volumes dealing with Cork and Waterford are much less
precious. Personally I always understood that the Husseys
hailed from Normandy, as will be seen a few pages on, but
tradition on such a point is not of much value.
Anyway the family of Hussey settled in very early times
at Dingle, and also had several lands and castles in the barony
of Corkaquiny.
Dingle was the only town in this barony, and it was incor-
porated by Queen Elizabeth in 1585, when she granted it the
same privileges which were enjoyed by Drogheda, with a
superiority over the harbours of Ventry and Smerwick. The
Virgin Sovereign also presented the town with ^^300 for the
purpose of making a wall round it.
The Irish formerly called Dingle Daingean in Cushy, or
the fastness of the Husseys. One of the FitzGeralds, Earl of
Desmond, had granted to an ancestor of my own a con-
siderable tract of land in these parts, namely, from Castle-
Drum to Dingle, or as others say, he gave him as much as
he could walk over in his jackboots in one day. That Hussey
built a castle, said to be the first erected at Dingle, the vaults
of which were afterwards used as the county gaol.
There is mention of this in the grant of a charter to Dingle
ANCESTRY 3
by King James i. in the fourth year of his reign : ' The house
of John Hussey granted for a gaol and common hall to the
corporation.'
A grim interest lurks in the fact that the dedication of
Smith's History to Lord Newport, Lord Chancellor of Ireland,
recites that ' this Kingdom, my lord, is a kind of Terra
Incognita to the greater part of Europe,'
Is it not so to this day ?
Do I not meet scores of people who tell me they would
love to go to Kerry, but they have never been nearer than
Killarney.
That is the sort of speech which makes me wonder how
geography is taught.
It is on a par with the remark of a prominent Arctic
explorer, that he had never been to Killarney because it was
so far off.
People, however, who go there apparently like it.
The chief Elizabethan settlers in Kerry were William and
Charles Herbert, Valentine Brown, ancester of the Kenmares,
Edmund Denny, and Captain Conway, whose daughter Avis
rnarried Robert Blennerhasset, while a little later, in 1600,
John Crosbie was made Bishop of Ardfert and Aghadoe.
To-day the descendants of those settlers are still among
the principal folk in Kerry, though that is more due to
their own selves than to the support they had from any
British Government.
This Valentine Brown, who was a worshipful and valiant
knight, wrote a discourse for settling Munster in 1584. His
plan was to exterminate the FitzGeralds and to protestantise
Ireland ; but by the irony of fate his own son married a
daughter of the Earl of Desmond and became a Roman
Catholic.
4 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
In the Carew Manuscript it is recorded that he estimated
that one constable and six men would suffice for Cork, but
for Ventry, ' a large harbour near Dingle,' one constable
and fifty men were necessary ; so he evidently had a clear
apprehension of the villainous capabilities of the men of
Kerry.
It is also recorded that in the parish of Killiney is a strong-
hold called Castle Gregory, which before the wars of 1641
was possessed by Walter Hussey, who was proprietor of the
Magheries and Ballybeggan. Having a considerable party
under his command, he made a garrison of his castle, whence
having been long pressed by Cromwell's forces, he escaped in
the night with all his men, and got into Minard Castle, in
which he was closely beset by Colonels Lehunt and Sadler.
After some time had been spent, the English observing that
the besieged were making use of pewter bullets, powder was
laid under the vaults of the castle, and both Walter Hussey
and his men were blown up.
Prior to this, 'on January 31, 1641, Walter Hussey, with
Florence MacCarthy and others, attacked Ballybeggan Castle,
plundered and burnt the house of Mr. Henry Huddleston,
and did the same to the house and haggards of Mr. Hore,
where they built an engine called a saw, having its three sides
made musket-proof with boards. It was drawn on four wheels,
each a foot high, with folding doors to open inwards and
several loopholes to shoot through, without a floor, so that
ten or twelve men who went therein might drive it forwards.
These machines were set against castle walls whilst the men
within them attempted to make a breach with crows and
pickaxes.'
Infernal machines are, after all, not confined to our own
times, and this same rascally ancestor of my own appears to
ANCESTRY 5
have had predatory habits more likely to be appreciated by his
followers than by his foes.
Dingle is now a somewhat dilapidated town, but that was
not always the case, for it is mentioned in my dear old friend
Froude's History of England that the then Earl of Desmond
called on the ambassador of Charles v. at his lodgings in
Dingle. The old records of the place would be worth
diligent antiquarian research, a matter even more difficult in
Ireland than elsewhere. Should all be brought to light, I
fancy the part played by my family would not grow smaller.
The Husseys spread away over the county, after having
their lands forfeited under both Elizabeth and Cromwell,
which was the most respectable thing to suffer in those times.
In the reign of Queen Anne, Colonel Maurice Hussey sold
Cahirnane to the Herberts, and there is a garden still called
Hussey's Garden in the property. He built a mortuary
chapel for himself on the top of a small hill just outside the
gates of Muckross, where his own grave near that beautiful
abbey can be seen to this day.
This Colonel Maurice Hussey resided for some time in
England, and appears to have married an English lady ; and it
is odd that though a Roman Catholic he was trusted by the
Governments of both William and Anne. There seems to
have been something versatile about his rather mysterious
career, the key to which may be found in the surmise that
until the accession of King George he was a Jacobite at heart ;
which throwo some doubt on his assertion in a letter that there
are very few Tories — or outlaws — in Kerry, where the Whig
rule was never enforced with great severity. He was, how-
ever, committed to 'Trally jail' {i.e. Tralee) on the fear of a
landing by the Pretender, whence he wrote pleading letters, in
one of which he mentions that his son-in-law, MacCartie, has
6 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
taken the oaths of abjuration ; and later, when released, he
seems to have been disturbed at the large number of German
Protestants, driven out of the Palatinate by Louis the Four-
teenth, who settled at Bally M'EUigott.
Any one who rambles about Dingle and investigates the
older buildings, so carefully examined by Mr, Hitchcock,
will notice how frequent is the emblem of a tree ; and that is
a conspicuous feature of the Hussey armorial bearings.
With reference to the allusions made in Smith's book to
my ancestors, it may be pointed out that he repeated the
popular tradition at the very time when the Husseys, like the
rest of their fellow Catholics all over the country, were dis-
inherited and depressed, and when he could gain nothing by
doing them honour.
As for my name, it seems to have really been Norman,
and to have been De La Huse, De La Hoese, and later
Husee, Huse, and, finally, Hussey.
Burke in his extinct Peerage states that Sir Hugh Husse
came to Ireland, 17 Hen. 11., and married the sister of
Theobald Fitz Walter, first Butler of Ireland, and that he died
seized of large possessions in Meath. His son married the
daughter of Hugh de Lacy, senior Earl of Ulster, and their
great-grandson, Sir John Hussey, Knight, first Earl of Galtrim,
was summoned to Parliament in 1374.
Moreover, the State Papers in the Public Record Office,
quoted in the Journal of the Royal Society of Irish Antiquaries for
September 1 893, p. 266, prove beyond question that Nicholas de
Huse or Hussy and his father, Herbert de Huse, were land-
owners of some importance in Kerry in 1 307. Stirring times they
must have been, of which we have no fiction under the guise of
history, though then men had to fight hard to preserve their
lives and maintain their dignity. We can imagine the tussle.
ANCESTRY 7
even in these degenerate days when no challenge follows the
exchange of insults, even in the House of Commons, and when
the perpetration of the most cowardly outrage in Ireland has
to be induced by preliminary potations of whisky. Of course,
those old times were bad times, but the badness was at least
above board and the warfare pretty stoutly waged. There is
some sense in fighting your foe hand to hand, but to-day when
a battle is contested by armies which never see one another,
and are decimated by silent bullets, the courage needed is of a
different character, and the wicked murder of such combats is
obvious.
But let us quit war and confiscation for the equally stormy
region known as politics, wherein it may be noted that in 16 13
Michael Hussey was Member of Parliament for Dingle.
Now for a coincidence in Christian names.
Only two Husseys forfeited in the Desmond Rebellion,
and they were John and Maurice.
In the Irish Parliament of James 11., when Kerry returned
eight members, two of them were Husseys, and their names
were John and Maurice.
My grandfather's name was John, and his father before
him was Maurice, and I christened my two surviving sons
John and Maurice.
We do not go in for much variety of nomenclature in our
family.
My grandfather, John Hussey, lived at Dingle, his mother
being a member of the well-known Galway family of Bodkin.
He was an offshoot of the Walter Hussey who had been
converted into an animated projectile by the underground
machinations of Cromwell's colonels. He was a very little
man, who had a landed property at Dingle, did nothing in
particular, and received the usual pompous eulogy on his
8 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
tombstone. I never heard that he left any papers or diaries,
and I do not think that he ever went out of Kerry — he had
too much sense.
A rather diverting story in which his sister was the heroine
may be worth telHng, if only because it was so characteristic
of the period.
In those days, as now, Husseys and Dennys were closely
associated, and both my great-aunt and Miss Denny, known
locally as the ' Princess Royal,' were going to a ball. At that
time it was the fashion for the girls of the period to wear
muslin skirts edged with black velvet. The muslin was easily
procured ; not so the velvet, which was eventually obtained
by sacrificing an ancient pair of nether garments belonging
to my great-grandfather.
After the early dinner then fashionable, each of the damsels
was departing for the Castle, with a swain at the door of her
sedan-chair, when our kinswoman. Lady Donoughmore, who
was on the door-step watching them off, enthusiastically
shouted : —
* Success to the breeches ! Success to the breeches ! '
Imagine the horrified confusion of the poor 'Princess Royal,'
not then eighteen.
This episode reminds me of the modern Scottish story of a
tiresome small boy who wanted more cake at a tea-party, and
threatened his parents with dire revelations if they did not
comply with his demands. As they showed no signs of
intimidation, he banged on the table to obtain attention, and
then announced : —
' Ma new breeks are made out of the winter curtains.'
An incident connected with one of the earliest private
carriages in Kerry is worth telling. The vehicle in question
had just been purchased by a certain Miss Mullins, daughter
ANCESTRY 9
of a former Lord Ventry, who regarded it on its arrival with
almost sacred awe. A dance in the neighbourhood seemed an
appropriate opportunity for impressing the county with her
newly acquired grandeur, but the night proving wet, she
insisted on reverting to a former mode of progression, and
rode pillion behind her coachman.
The result was that she caught a violent chill, which
turned to pneumonia, and as her relatives were assembled
round her deathbed, the old lady exclaimed, between her last
gasps for breath : —
' Thank God I never took out the carriage that wet night.'
CHAPTER II
PARENTAGE AND EARLY YEARS
My father, Peter Bodkin Hussey, was for a long time a
barrister at the Irish Bar, practising in the Four Courts, where
more untruths are spoken than anywhere else in the three
kingdoms, except in the House of Commons during an Irish
debate. All law in Ireland is a grave temptation to lying, and
the greatest number of Courts produced a stupendous amount
of mendacity — or it was so in earlier times, at all events.
Did you ever hear the tale of the old woman who came to
Daniel O'Connell, outside the Four Courts, as he was walking
down the steps, and said to him : —
' Would your honour be so kind as to tell me the name of
an honest attorney ? '
The Liberator stopped, scratched his head in a perplexed
way, and replied : —
' Well now, ma'am, you bate me intoirely.'
My father had red hair, and was very impetuous. There-
fore he was christened ' Red Precipitate ' by Jerry Kellegher.
This legal luminary was a noted wit even at the Irish Bar
of that time, a confraternity where humour was almost as
rampant as creditors — irresponsible fun, and a light purse are
generally allied ; your wealthy fellow has too much care for
his gold to have spirits to be mirthful.
The tales about him are endless. Here are just a few I
have heard from my father's lips.
10
PARENTAGE AND EARLY YEARS ii
Jerry had a cousin, a wine merchant, who supplied the
Bar mess, and a complaint was lodged that the bottles were
very small.
To which Jerry retorted : —
' You idiot, don't you know they shrink in the washing,'
which satisfied the grumbler. And that always seemed to me
the strangest part of the story.
In those days religious feeling ran pretty high — I will not
go so far as to say it has entirely died down to-day — and the
usual Protestant toast was : —
' The Pope, the Devil, and the Pretender.'
Now, Jerry was a Roman Catholic, none the less earnest
because he had a merry way with him. On a certain Friday
he was seen to be fasting by a very foppish barrister, who
thought a great deal of himself.
He remarked to Jerry, with unnecessary impertinence : —
' Sir, it appears you have some of the Pope in your
stomach.'
To which Jerry, quick as a pistol-shot, retorted : —
' And you have the whole of the Pretender in your head,'
after which there was the devil to pay.
There was a certain Chancellor in Ireland who was born a
few years after his father and mother had separated. As he
did not like Jerry, he used to make a great fuss about how he
should pronounce his name. At last in Court one day he
burst out : —
' Pray tell me what you wish me to call you — Mr.
Kellegher, or Mr. Kellaire ? '
' Call me anything you like, my lud, so long as you call
me born in wedlock.'
The Chancellor did not score that time.
At one time there were grave complaints made about the
12 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
light-hearted way in which Jerry handled his cases, and his
practice fell off. He was conversing with a very stupid
judge, lately elevated to the Bench, and observed : —
' It 's a very extraordinary world : you have risen by your
gravity, and I have fallen by my levity.'
He had a son who, in my time, had a large practice at the
Bar, but I never came across him, nor did I ever hear that
there was anything remarkable about him, except that he was
not so witty as his father, which was not wonderful.
After all, as Jerry was before my own experience, I must
not delay over him, so I will only give one more tale about
him, and pass on.
When Lord Avonmore got his peerage for voting for the
Union, he had his patent of nobility read out at a dinner-party,
and it commenced, ' George, of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland.'
' Stop,' cried Jerry, ' I object to that. The consideration
is set out too early in the deed.'
This long digression over, I revert to my father about
whose respectable practice at the Four Courts I know nothing
except that he allowed others to become judges, and did not
find solicitors putting his services up to auction.
By the death of his elder brother, he succeeded to a pro-
perty, near Dingle, on which he went to live and then got
married, which was the wisest thing that he could do.
My mother was Mary Hickson, and her descent was this
wise.
The Murrays were said to have come to Scotland from
Moravia in the first century ; and a pretty bulky history of
the clan reveals as much truth about them as the author cared
to put in when tired of inventing less probable facts. Sir
Walter Murray, Lord of Drumshegrat, came to Ireland with
PARENTAGE AND EARLY YEARS 13
Edward de Bruce and was killed in battle, leaving three sons,
one of whom, christened Andrew, settled in County Down.
Some of his descendants migrated to Bantry, where, in 1670,
William Murray married Ann Hornswell, and was succeeded
by his third son George, who was in turn succeeded by his
eldest son William, who married Anne Grainger. Of the
marriage, there was only one daughter Judith, who married
Robert Hickson, heir to the property.
They had five sons and two daughters, the younger of
whom married Sir William Cox, and the elder my father.
The superior of my dear mother never drew the breath
of life. She lived until I was twenty-five, and I never met
any man who could say more than I could for my mother,
though equalled by what my own sons could say of theirs, and
she too came of the same stock, for I married my first cousin,
Julia Agnes Hickson. It is said no man is thoroughly happy
until he is suitably married, an opinion I absolutely endorse ;
but happiness so great as my married life is not of public
interest, and if it were, I should not wear my heart on my
sleeve for general inspection. Any tribute from me to my
dear wife would be superfluous ; the devoted love of our
children has been the endorsement by the next generation
of the feelings which I have always felt towards her.
She was the daughter of my mother's eldest brother, John
Hickson, called the Sovereign of Dingle. He had powers to
collect customs, to hold a court, and to try cases in much the
same way that a lord provost had.
On one occasion when a case was to be tried, two attorneys
appeared from the town of Tralee, about thirty miles off.
Now John Hickson had his own ideas about the attorneys of
those days — ideas such as all honest men had, but dared not
express. So he sent a crier through the town to say that
14 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
the court was adjourned for a fortnight. When the appointed
day arrived, the attorneys arrived also, so again the melodious
tones of the crier proclaimed through the town that the court
was adjourned for yet another fortnight, Captain Hickson
remarking to his wife that he was not going to be helped
to administer justice by those who earned their living on
injustice. The attorneys gave it up in despair, leaving Captain
Hickson to lay down the law as he liked, and to do him
justice, his ideas were more conducive to peace and order than
the arguments of Irish attorneys generally are.
He was loved and revered by the people, so that when the
cholera raged in 1833 and 1834, and the constabulary were
ordered to go into the houses to remove the corpses (this
to prevent the people ' waking ' the dead, and so spreading
the contagion), they dared not enter the cabins unless Captain
Hickson went with them, as the people were so enraged at
their dead being molested that they would have killed the
police. Fortunately Captain Hickson had enough moral
influence to make the people obey the law.
In the eighties he would have been shot in the back by
some scoundrel who had primed himself with Dutch courage
from adulterated whisky.
He raised a Yeomanry Corps at the time of the Whiteboys
to guard the country against these lawless bands, and against
the dreaded French invasion. This regiment was called the
Dingle Yeomanry, and the tales about it are many.
On one occasion when Captain Hickson was in London,
the general from Dublin inspected the corps. In the absence
of the commanding officer, his brother was ordered to parade
the battalion, and being a nervous young man, he completely
forgot all the words of command, so to the unconcealed
amusement of the old martinet from the capital, he shouted : —
PARENTAGE AND EARLY YEARS 15
' Boys, do as you always do.'
It says well for the discipline of the regiment that they did
not implicitly obey the order.
His mother, this Mrs. Judith Hickson, was the only one
of my grand-parents I ever saw, and very little impression she
has left on my memory, except a notion that she had less
sense of humour than pertains to most Irishwomen by the
blessing of God and their own mother wit.
My father was a Roman Catholic, and my mother
a Protestant. By the terms of the marriage settlement,
we were all brought up in her faith, which occasioned a
tremendous row at that time, and nowadays would never
be tolerated by the priests.
All the same my father was an obstinate man, not dis-
posed to care much for the whole College of Cardinals, and
indifferent if he were cursed with bell and book. Of course
he was not a good-tempered man, or he would not have
justified his nickname of Red Precipitate, but he spared the
rod with me, and failed to keep me in order. I was the
youngest of a pretty large family and the pet into the
bargain.
My eldest brother, John, was drowned at St. Malo. He
was unmarried, and his profession was to do nothing as
handsomely as he could.
James was in the 13 th Light Dragoons, and subsequently
in the nth. He saw no service, and was an excellent soldier
at mess and off duty. I am not qualified to speak with
authority about his fulfilment of the trumpery trivialities
which fill up garrison life, but here is one anecdote about
him.
Soon after Lord Cardigan took command of the 13th
Light Dragoons, a great many of the officers left the corps.
1 6 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
and a man wrote to the papers to say that this was chiefly
due to the great expense of the mess.
My brother retorted in print that for his part the reason
was due to its being ' incompatible with my feelings as a
gentleman to remain in the regiment as it is equally impossible
to exchange out of a regiment that has the undeserved mis-
fortune to be commanded by his lordship.'
Edward lived at Dingle, and was much liked by the people
there. He was an active magistrate and a conscientious man.
He married and left two sons, one in the Horse Artillery
and the other a colonel in the Engineers. They have all
joined the great majority.
Robert, who chose to be an army surgeon, died in India,
leaving me without a relation in the world of my own
name.
It reminds me of the story in Charles O'Malley about the
old family in which it was hereditary not to have any children.
However, I altered that by having eleven of my own, two
sons, John and Maurice, and four daughters being alive, at the
present time. More power to them say I, in the current
phrase of good-will in Kerry.
My sister Mary died at Bath when I was born. It was
her health which prevented me from being by birth what I
am at heart, a Kerry man.
Ellen was married to Robert, elder brother of the late
Knight of Kerry, and her grand-daughter is married to
Colonel Thorneycroft of Spion Kop fame.
Ellen's sister, Julia, married Sir Peter FitzGerald, Knight
of Kerry. The two therefore married brothers, and if there
had been any more they might have done the same.
I suppose I ought to give the date of my birth, but despite
all the efforts of those in Ireland, who loved me so much that
PARENTAGE AND EARLY YEARS 17
they became active agents to convey me to heaven, I cannot
yet give you the date of my death.
My friend, Mr. Townshend Trench, is, I believe, writing a
book to prove the world will come to an end in about thirty
years' time, but that will see me out, and those then alive may
discover that the Great Landlord has given the tenants an
extension of the lease of the earth.
I was born on December 17, 1824, and I have none of
those infantile recollections which are such an insult on the
general attention when put in print.
Still my earliest memory is so characteristic of much that
was to follow that I set it down.
The very first thing I remember is being placed on the
seat of a trap beside the local R.M. (Resident Magistrate),
and thus going out, escorted by a party of soldiers, to collect
tithes.
I clapped my hands with glee, but an old woman by the
road-side said that it was a shame to take out that innocent
babe on such bloodthirsty work.
I could ride before I could walk, and was always fond of
the exercise. What Irishman is not ^
My taste for this was fostered by my father, who had
broken his leg when young, and not only disliked walking,
but had a slight limp, which did not prevent him being in the
saddle for many hours each day.
As a child, I led a fresh, natural, out-of-doors, healthy
life, exposed to wind and rain, and all the better for both.
There are very few trees about Dingle, and I quite agree with
the remark of an American that it was the most open country
he had ever seen.
I was always bathing, but I never got drowned, not even
in liquor, although I have sat with some of the best in that
B
1 8 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
capacity. I have myself been pretty temperate in everything,
to which I attribute my longevity. And yet I am not sure
that any rule can be laid down in this respect, for I have
known men who saturated themselves in alcohol until they
ought to have been kept out of sight of all decent people live
longer than those that have kept straight in every way.
In proof of this, let me quote the delightful account of a
centagenarian out of Smith's History of Kerry ^ a book already
referred to, and which can now be finally put back on its shelf,
dry as dust, as Carlyle might say, ' but pregnant with food for
thought, ay, and for grim mirth,' — those are not exactly the
words of the Sage of Chelsea, but just have the rub of his
tongue about them.
'Mr. Daniel MacCarty died in February 1751,' as the
account said, * in the 112th year of his age. He lived
during his whole life in the barony of Iveragh, and buried
four wives. He married a fifth in the eighty-fourth year
of his age, and she but a girl of fourteen, by whom he
had several children. He was always a very healthy man,
no cold ever affecting him, and he could not bear the
warmth of a shirt at night, but put it under his pillow.
He drank for many of the last years of his life great
quantities of rum and brandy, which he called the naked
truth ; and if, in compliance to other gentlemen, he drank
claret or punch, he always took an equal quantity of spirits
to qualify those liquors : this he called a wedge. No man
ever saw him spit. His custom was to walk eight or ten
miles in a winter's morning over mountains with greyhounds
and finders, and he seldom failed to bring home a brace of
hares. He was an innocent man, and inherited the social
virtues of the antient Milesians. He was of a florid com-
plexion, looked amazingly well for a person of his age and
PARENTAGE AND EARLY YEARS 19
manners of life, for his use of spirituous liquors was pro-
digious, a custom that much prevails in these baronies.'
Indeed, no one who was slightly acquainted with the
characteristics of the inhabitants of the Kingdom of Kerry
would suggest that total abstinence was even to-day their
predominant virtue.
It is the fashion to say that it is a good thing to be one
of a large family. From a financial point of view I am quite
certain that the reverse is preferable, and as 1 was the youngest
of nine — two others besides those I mentioned, James and
Anne, coming to early demises — I received as many kicks
and cuffs from my brethren as I did halfpence and affection
from my parents. So, like Thackeray, as a child I sympathised
with Lord MacTurk who wished to cut off the heads of his
brethren. Now I have survived them all, and I fondly regret
the sounds of voices that are still.
But as I sit in my arm-chair and ruminate over the past,
which every old man must do in the intervals of reading
the Times, going to the club, or losing his money by careful
attention to speculation, I have the consolation of remem-
bering that I did as much mischief as any other child. To
be a really good child means that the animal is a prig or
unhealthy. To-day I am fond of all my grandchildren, but
the one 1 like best is the one which proves himself or herself
the naughtiest for the moment.
This is a hard saying for parents, and not a good precept
for the young, but there is soHd truth in it and a bit of
common-sense too, for it is best to get the original sin out
in the years of innocence.
CHAPTER III
EDUCATION
Perhaps the biggest wrench in life is going to school. It
may not seem so very much afterwards — as the boy said of
the tooth when he looked at it in the dentist's forceps — but
the wrench is really bad.
I learned my letters from my mother, and picked up a
few other smatterings before I had daily lessons from a tutor
at Dingle. Strange to say, a very good classical education
could have been obtained there in the thirties, better, so far
as I can estimate, than could have been expected from a town
double the size at the same period in England.
At the age of ten I was sent to Huddard's, then a very
sound school in Dublin. I was well enough taught, not caned
enough for my deserts, though more than sufficed for my
feelings, and sufficiently fed, but at the end of two years
I had to leave owing to ill health.
An apothecary, who selfishly recollected that the more
medicines I took the better for him if not for me, converted
me into a human receptacle for his empirical abominations,
but another surgeon, who was rather tardily called in, packed
me off to the country.
One of the leading Dublin physicians certified that I had
only one lung ; but as the other has served me faithfully for
sixty-nine years, I am rather sceptical as to the accuracy of
his diagnosis.
20
EDUCATION 21
I remember very little about Huddard's, except that it was
in Mountjoy Square, and about a hundred boys were herded
there in unsought proximity. We boarders always fought
the town boys, but also had to cajole them in humiliating
ways to smuggle us in contraband articles of food. The
meals at Huddard's were fairly good, no doubt, as school fare
goes, but the sugary stick-jaw stuff for which the soul of
a boy longs was naturally not part of the official bill of fare.
The bullying was of a reasonable nature, or at all events I
could hold my own with the best of them, being indifferent
to punishment so long as I could hit out effectively from the
shoulder. One of the ushers, a dwarf of malignant disposition,
was an awful tyrant, and we always had an ardent desire to tar
and feather him, only we did not know how to set about the
operation even if we had ventured to attempt it.
After a happy interval of convalescence at home, I was
sent to a smaller school kept by Mr. Hogg at Limerick.
One of the boys there subsequently became that illustrious
ornament of the Bench, Lord Justice Barry.
He was a very eloquent man, counted so even at the Irish
Bar, where a certain high-flown loquacity is pretty prevalent,
and had a great repute. He arrived at Cork once, and had
to fight his way through a dense throng to get into court.
On inquiring the reason of the crowd, he was told that every-
body wanted to hear the big speech that was expected from
Councillor Barry.
' Well, unless you make way for me it 's disappointed every
mother's son of you will be, for I am twin to Councillor
Barry, and I never heard tell he had a brother.'
He carried on the old-fashioned habit of after-dinner
conviviality, and used to sit drinking three hours after the
wine had been put on the table, which was why I never
22 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
accepted his hospitality in after years, for, as I said before,
I am a man of moderation.
In my young days it was the regular thing to bring in
whisky-punch after dinner ; and for many years I regularly
took one tumbler and never had a second, not once to the
best of my recollection.
There is a good deal of change in the habits of life.
When I was a boy coffee was unknown for breakfast, cocoa
had not become known as a beverage, and tea was regularly
drunk. We seldom took lunch, nor did the ladies, and after-
noon tea was unheard of. Instead, tea was brought into the
drawing-room about eight in the evening, and was always
drunk very weak and sweet. In those times it was invariably
from China and pretty costly.
We dined at five. Dinners were very solid. Soup was a
pretty regular opening, but could be dispensed with without
comment, and it was almost always greasy. At Dingle fish
was pretty plentiful, but sweets were regarded as a great
extravagance.
I remember, when grown up, dining with an elderly man
near Cahirciveen, who had a turbot for which he must have
paid at least eight shillings, but he apologised for not having
a pudding on account of the necessity for economy, though a
pudding would not have cost him eightpence.
Made dishes were very few and badly cooked. The food
was chiefly joints, and, in nine cases out of ten, roast mutton.
Vegetables were not so much eaten as now, always excepting
potatoes, which were consumed in large quantities. There
was practically no fruit, except a few apples and oranges at
Christmas.
Men sat very long over their wine. Sherry used to be
served at dinner and often claret afterwards, but the great
EDUCATION 23
beverage was port. I am Inclined to think that port has
sensibly deteriorated since my young days. It was as a
rule more fruity then, but we never talked of our livers, as
subalterns and undergraduates do nowadays.
Port used to come direct to Dingle. It was an easy
harbour ' to run,' and there was some smuggling.
On one occasion some soldiers were sent to protect the
gauger, who was bent on making an important seizure. A
few of the inhabitants of Dingle took the opportunity of
entertaining the officer, and whilst he slumbered from the
effects of their hospitality, the opportunity for making the
seizure was lost.
There is no particular reason why I should tell the follow-
ing story here, but it is worth recording, and I don't know
any other part of my reminiscences where it is more likely to
slip in appropriately.
In Kerry in 18 15, the farmers had been an extra long time
fattening up their pigs. After the Peace, prices all fell, and
though the farmers were reluctant, they had to yield to cir-
cumstances. One day the dealers were buying at extremely
low rates in Tralee market, when the postman brought the
news that Napoleon had escaped from Elba.
Instantly all the farmers broke off their bargains, and
proceeded to start homeward with their swine, shouting : —
' Hurrah for Boney that rose the pigs.'
My mother often told me of this scene, which she herself
witnessed.
There was always a distinct sympathy with France, owing
to the smuggling from that land, and after the English had
prohibited the exportation of wool, it was smuggled into
France, whence were brought back silks and brandy.
The geography of Kerry is ideal for landing contraband
24 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
store, and I should say even more was done in this respect
locally than on the coast of Scotland.
There is a certain amount of good-will between people
whose mutual interests are similar until they fall out, and
the hope of a French landing in Ireland, though never
very serious, always fanned the native disaffection to the
Government in the West.
The veracity of an Irishman is never considerable, for as
a rule he will say what he thinks likely to please you rather
than state any unpleasant fact. Of course the gauger — excise
officer — was an especially unpopular personage, and I doubt
if a tithe of the lies told to him were ever considered worthy
of being confessed at all.
O'Connell's family made much money by smuggling,
which was a pursuit that carried not the slightest moral
reproach. Indeed ' to go agin the Government ' in any sort
of way has always been an act of super-excellence.
The most lucrative side of the commercial enterprises of
Morgan O'Connell was his trade in contraband goods. In
Derrynane Bay, he and his brother landed cargoes which
were sent over the hills on horses' backs to receivers in
Tralee.
Of O'Connell himself most stories have been told, but
it is difficult to indicate the enormous influence he had over
the lower classes in his own country.
Years before George iv. had aptly expressed the situation
amid his maudlin tears over Catholic emancipation.
' Wellington is King of England, O'Connell is King of
Ireland, and I suppose I 'm only considered Dean of Windsor.'
As an advocate, the Liberator had many of the attributes
of Kenealy, and his popularity was so great that he was often
briefed in every case at an assize.
EDUCATION 25
There is no doubt that he bullied judges, was allowed
enormous laxity in browbeating opposing counsel and wit-
nesses, and, like Father O'Flynn, had a wonderful way with
him, so far as the jury was concerned.
When I saw him in Dublin, I at once realised how true
must be the bulk of the stories of his great conceit. He has
been elevated into a superhuman being by the posthumous
praise of hundreds of blatant mob orators.
Dan had two brothers, John and James. The latter was
the first baronet, and noted for his witty sayings.
He presided at a dinner given for the purpose of present-
ing an address to the manager of a bank. On the toast of
the Army and Navy being proposed, the only man who could
return thanks for the former was a solicitor named Murphy,
who said that if he were forced to respond to the toast, it
clearly proved what a peaceful community they lived in,
adding : —
' It is such a long time since I laid by the sash and the
sword, that I have forgotten my drill.'
' But you have never forgotten the charge,' observed the
chairman, who had a long bill from Murphy in his pocket at
the time.
On another occasion, a lady spoke to James about sub-
scribing to the Roman Catholic Cathedral at Killarney.
' For my part,' she observed, ' it 's little I can do in my
lifetime, but I have left all my money for the good of my
soul.'
' I believe, ma'am,' says James, ' you were an original
shareholder in the Provincial Bank. The shares are now
quoted at eighty and they pay six per cent. That is very
much like twenty-one per cent, on the original capital.'
' I am not a clever man like you at making these calcula-
26 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
tions,' replies the lady ; ' I have higher and holier things to
think about.'
* Don't say that again to me, ma'am,' says he. * I put my
money into farms, and I get five per cent, from a grumbling
and unsatisfactory set of tenants. And what are you getting ?
Twenty-one per cent, in this world and salvation in the next.
It 's the most damnable interest I ever heard tell of, either in
this world or any other.'
Yet another tale about him.
He had received an unconscionable bill of costs from an
attorney, and happening to meet a Roman Catholic bishop in
Cork, he asked him if an attorney could ever be saved.
' Why not .'' Even an extortioner can be if he make
ample restitution in his life-time, and dies fortified with the
rites of the Church.'
' May be so, my lord,' replied Sir James, ' you know more
about these things than I do, but if it is as you say, you are
taking a confounded amount of unnecessary trouble about the
rest of us.'
The bishop was not a bit disconcerted.
* I am an honest labourer striving to be worthy of my
hire,' he explained.
And at that Sir James left it, because he said it was not
respectful to ask too many invidious questions about a man
who had the making of your soul at his own will.
All this is a digression from my education, which was as
desultory as these reminiscences.
After a spell at Limerick I was again sent home ill, and
for six months I really had to be treated as an invalid. I was
always very fond of books, notably history, and I think I have
read pretty well every book published upon the history of
Ireland. It was at this time I began teaching myself a bit.
EDUCATION 27
and that is the teaching which is better than any other, except
what one has to learn against one's own will and for one's own
advantage in the school of life. Like a good many other people
I was led to history not only by a shortage of lighter books at
home, but also by curiosity aroused by the novels of Sir Walter
Scott. In the way of promoting better reading, I believe
Scott has been far more beneficial than any other writer of
fiction in English.
I was for a short time at school in Exeter, and then at a
rather rough establishment at Woolwich, where my father
wished me to have the tuition in mathematics which could be
obtained from the masters in the Academy at irregular times.
By all accounts the fagging and bullying in that establishment
were appalling. The headmaster of the school I was at was
an able fellow, and many of the cadets used to come to have
a grind with him. Some of their tales were ' hair-erectors,'
as the Americans say.
One new boy had the misfortune to sprain his ankle,
and to incur the fury of the head of dormitory on the
same evening. The latter tied his game ankle up to his
thigh, and fastening him by the wrist to the bottom of the
bed, made him stand the better part of the night on his bad
ankle.
This reminds me of the story of a certain royal prince
going to an educational establishment and being asked who
his parents were. On his reply, the senior — or ' John ' — gave
him a terrific cuff on the side of the head saying : — •
* That 's for your father, the prince.'
And before the half-stunned boy recovered, he received a
stinging blow on the other ear with : —
' That 's for your mother, the princess, and now black my
boots.'
2 8 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
His Highness could say nothing, but in time he grew to
be the biggest and the worst bully.
Then the younger brother of his former tormentor came,
and the prince sent for him, and telling him what his brother
had done some years before, made him bend down and flogged
him so unmercifully that he had to go into hospital.
Years after, when in an important position, he met his
former victim, now a general, and congratulating him on his
career said : —
' Perhaps I made your success by giving you that tanning
at Sandhurst.'
I wonder whether there was murder in the heart of the
grim old warrior at the recollection. Of course that would
not be strange, for many a time officers have been actually
shot in action by their own men.
Here is a perfectly true story, only neither the men nor
the officer need be specified.
A colonel who had grossly mismanaged the regiment knew
his fate was sealed.
So when the men paraded for the engagement, he said : —
' I know you mean to shoot me to-day, but for God's sake
don't do so until we have won the battle.'
This was greeted with a cheer, and he came back safe to
be decorated and to play whist at his club as badly as any
member in it.
I am not sure that cards ought not to be considered part
of every lad's training. If a man goes through life without
touching a card, he probably loses a good deal of innocent
amusement, and debars himself from much pleasant society.
If he learns to play when grown up, he may find it a costly
and unsatisfactory branch of education. But if he is taught
to play reasonably well as a boy, and is shown that excellent
EDUCATION 29
games can be had without gambling — I do not consider an
infinitesimal stake, in proportion to his means, gambling — he
will have an extra amusement made for him and a relaxation
after his day's work.
A near relative of my own gets his club cronies to play
bridge with his son, aged eighteen, and pays his losses, in
order that he may be thoroughly grounded in the game. The
lad is a capital boy, and all the better for his early association
with elder men on their own level.
One of the resources of my old age is three games of
picquet every night after dinner with my wife, and very much
I enjoy them. There is often the fashionable bridge played
in the room by my children and their friends, but I have never
taken a hand, though in younger days I derived a fair
amount of diversion from whist.
CHAPTER IV
FARMING
My years of schooling having come to an end, I was back in
Ireland in full enjoyment of youth, high spirits, and thought-
less carelessness. These holiday times were delightful. I
could be in the saddle all day if I liked, was free to shoot or
bathe as I pleased, had dogs at my disposal, could pass the
time of day with all sorts and conditions of men — a thing
which I have relished all my life — and in fact led the gay
existence of the younger offshoot of an Irish squire.
In those days things were not so impecunious in Ireland
as they subsequently became, but there was always a vivacious
Hibernian scorn for false pretension, and a determination to
have the best possible time, such as you can read in Lever's
novels of old, and the capital tales of those two clever ladies,
Miss Martin and Miss Somerville, to-day.
It is perfectly true that there are many Irish landlords in
sporting counties who cannot have three hundred a year, and
yet all their sons and daughters manage to hunt four days
a week.
This would be impossible out of Ireland, and is absolutely
incomprehensible even there ; but the fact remains that it is
done, and all one can remark is to echo the patter of the
conjuror : —
' Wonderful, isn't it } '
I, however, was not destined to be left a derelict at home,
30
FARMING 31
as falls to the hapless lot of far too many good fellows in
Ireland.
There were a good many family counsels, and the authori-
ties could not make up their minds what to do with me.
However, I thought farming was the idlest occupation, and
suggested it should be my profession — an idea hailed with
rapture, principally because it saved everybody the trouble of
racking their brains about me.
Personally, I have often regretted that what in modern
phrase may be called the ' Stevenson boom ' did not coincide
with my search for a career. Big posts were in due time
going for engineers ; and those young men who had the stamp
of apprenticeship to, or association with, the great man could
get almost anything in the days of the fever for railway
construction.
Even later than the period I am now recalling, the journey
from Dublin to Dingle would take more than two days, and,
so far as I can recollect, it certainly took five from Dingle
to London. Those coaching journeys were terrible experiences
in wet weather, for you were drenched outside and suffocated
inside, whilst you paid more than three times the present
railway fare for the miserable privilege of this uncomfort-
able means of transit.
The old posting hotels used to be uncommonly good and
comfortable, whilst they did a thriving trade. The coach
purported to give you ample time to breakfast and dine
at certain capital hostels, but by a private arrangement
between mine host and the guard and driver, the meals
used to be abruptly closured in order to save the landlord's
larder.
On the way down from Dublin, a thirty minutes' pause was
allowed at Naas for breakfast ; but on the occasion of my story.
32 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
as well as on every other, after a quarter of an hour the waiter
announced the coach was just starting.
Everybody ran out to regain their seats, except one com-
mercial traveller, who picked up all the teaspoons and put
them in the teapot before calmly resuming his meal.
Back came the waiter with : —
* Not a moment to spare, sir.'
' All right,' said the traveller ; ' which of the passengers
has taken the teaspoons ? '
The waiter gave one glance of horror, and then pro-
ceeded to have every one on the coach examined for the
missing articles.
By the time that the commercial traveller had calmly
finished a hearty meal there was nearly a riot, and then he
emerged from the coffee-room, and suggested that the waiter
had better look in the teapot.
By the way, I don't fancy that he regularly travelled on
that road, for he would have been a marked man at Naas for
years to come.
I was seventeen at the time when I had decided, with
parental acquiescence, to be a farmer, and I was sent to learn
my profession to the south of Scotland, to a farmer named
Bogue.
I there acquired, at all events, one curious fact, which has
stuck in my head ever since, and it is thus : —
Scotland and Ireland are governed by the same Sovereign,
Lords, and Commons. Scotland is the best farmed country
in Europe, and Ireland about the worst.
One pair of horses in Scotland were then supposed to
cultivate fifty acres of tillage, and in Ireland the average was
one horse to five acres. Indeed it is in both cases much the
same to-day.
FARMING 33
In reality a farm is a workshop from which you turn out
as much produce as possible. But on an Irish farm it is the
habit to squeeze out the last possible ounce without putting
anything in, for it is not run with an eye on future years,
but only in a hand-to-mouth, beggar-the-soil kind of way,
without a thought beyond contemporary exigencies.
There were several other pupils with Bogue, but I stuck
to the business more than the rest, who were perpetually galli-
vanting into Kelso, or even going up to Edinburgh, where
they learnt nothing which taught them their trade or put
money into their pockets. Therefore it happened that I was
selected by Bogue to have an excellent practical demonstration
of farming, after this wise. He had a pretty sharp illness,
and left me for a short time full management of all his six
hundred acres, and that bit of responsibility made a man of me
once and for all, I stepped out of boyhood instantly, and
became an adult in feelings and bearing ; but to this day I
hope my sense of fun is only keener than it was as a lad.
I acquired a good deal of common sense in Scotland, and
learnt to observe for myself, a thing many men never acquire,
and on their deathbeds they will never be able to enumerate
the opportunities they have consequently lost.
As I was to be a farmer, I thought it was no use to confine
my attention to the one I was on, but contracted the habit,
when work was at all slack, of going about to pick up what
wrinkles I could from other proprietors, as well as to make
observations on my own account.
Subsequently I have made two agricultural tours through
Scotland for the same purpose, getting as far north as
Sutherland, in order to find out how the Highland farmer
dealt with more barren soil under a less propitious climate. I
have noted more improvement in farming in Ayrshire in the
c
34 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
interval than in any other county. Yet there is a letter in
existence by Burns in which he observes that Ayrshire lairds
are getting English and East Lothian notions about rents, and
raising them so high that it will soon be a wilderness.
The fact is that the Scotsman is a farmer by nature, but
the Irishman is a farmer by inclination.
An Irishman tries to exist on land cultivated by the
minimum amount of labour, and does not farm a bit better if
his land is cheaper.
Every farmer in Scotland and England is laying down his
land in grass, and giving up tillage as fast as he can. It is
notorious that Ireland is more suitable for pasture than tillage,
and yet the Government have constituted a Board to break up
the rich grazing lands in Ireland and divide them into small
tillage farms, on which the tenants could not get a decent
living even if they had it free of rent and taxes.
Old Bogue was a bachelor by profession, and his poly-
gamistic tendencies were duly concealed, though pretty
generally known, as most things are in the country. He
had as housekeeper a woman so skinny that it made you feel
cold to look at her, and her disposition was on a par with her
appearance. Of course, it suited the national thrift, par-
ticularly congenial to Bogue, to feed us meanly, but we did
not relish her parsimonious economies.
There was one thing none of us might shirk, and that was
regular attendance at kirk on Sunday, I have been a church-
going man all my life — in my late years in London I have
especially appreciated the beautiful services at St. Anne's,
Soho — but the kirk has always been the breaking of precious
ointment over an unworthy head, so far as I am concerned.
The improvised prayer, that is always so carefully prepared,
and is often one delivered in regular rotation, always seems to
FARMING 2S
me rather humbugging for that reason, and the tremendously-
long sermons, which have a minimum of three quarters of an
hour, no matter what the text or the ability of the preacher,
are to me a vexation of spirit. I have occasionally heard good
sermons in kirk, but I think the standard of Scottish preaching
has always been overrated.
Moreover, I agree in the main with the American critic of
sermons, who said if a preacher can't strike ile in ten minutes
he has got a bad organ, or he is boring in the wrong place.
It is always unfair to bore in the pulpit, because the congre-
gation have no means of retaliation except by subsequently
staying away, and in the country that is not compatible with
the public worship of their Maker.
We have all heard the traditional stories about the divines
who, having found the sand of the hour-glass exhausted, calmly
reversed it and continued for a second spell, to the complete
satisfaction of the congregations. But in my experience only
one preacher could have done that without unendurably pro-
voking me, and he was Archbishop Magee, of whom I shall
have something to say when I am dealing with County Cork.
For the Scots in character I conceived much respect and
little enthusiasm. If there is anything more remarkable than
the hard-working powers of the Scottish farmer it is his capacity
for hard drinking. But that only makes him offensive in his
brief conviviality and morose in the long subsequent sulkiness.
Whereas I defy you to be seriously angry with a drunken
Irishman, if you have a due sense of humour — and without
that you have lost the salt of life. To my mind there is
something austere in the better characteristics of the Scot,
and also something hypocritical about his morality. You
always hear that professed in Scotland, and never in Ireland.
But in the latter fewer illegitimate children are born
-,6 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
J
than in any other country in Europe, and in Scotland — notably
Glasgow — the high percentage has become sadly proverbial.
Yet, despite these adverse points, the Scottish character has a
native grandeur which must provoke admiration, though all
my warmth of feelings goes to my own oft-erring countrymen.
I returned to Ireland in 1843 with the intention of farming
in Kerry on the scientific system I had learned in Berwickshire.
However, I found the land so subdivided that it was not only
difficult, but impossible, to obtain a farm of sufficient size to
return a reasonable percentage on the necessary outlay. The
population of Kerry was then 293,880, and the land was
divided into 25,848 farms, the holders of which, I may say,
entirely depended for existence on 26,030 acres of potatoes.
To give an example of the intense love of subdivision, I
knew a case where one horse was the property of three
* farmers,' and as they differed as to who was to pay for
the fourth shoe, they sold the horse, which was bought by
an uncle of mine.
Few farmers ate meat except at Christmas. They wore
homespun flannel and frieze, and their only luxury, whisky,
was obtainable at a quarter of its present price. A young
couple were considered ready to start in married life when
they had obtained a ' farm,' consisting of a couple of acres for
potatoes and a mud hovel for themselves ; and thus a popu-
lation, dependent on a precarious root, increased very rapidly.
It was thicker near the sea coast than inland. The rents then
were about double what they are now (though half what they
had been at the beginning of the nineteenth century), yet, with
good potato crops, people seemed content and times were fairly
good. I should say there was not such general drunkenness
as in later times, and very little porter was consumed in those
days — at all events outside Dublin. What schools there were
FARMING 37
were shockingly bad, and reading, not to say writing, was an
exceptional accomplishment, not only among the labouring
classes, but among those who held their heads much higher.
This of course impressed me coming straight from Scotland,
where a really grand education has been the national birth-
right for generations.
I began to farm about sixty acres near Dingle, and gave
my entire time to it, an assiduity I have compared in my
mind to that of the Norwegian reclaiming the little arable
spots on the mountain. We both worked pretty hard for
very scanty results. I did not even live on my tiny property,
but with my mother — my father had died after I returned
from my English schools and before I went to Kelso.
Still matters were not long satisfactory, owing to the
failure of the potato crop in 1845, when the mortaUty became
fearful in consequence.
So at the very end of the year I migrated from Kerry
to become an assistant land agent in Cork, and thus really
embarked on the profession of my life — one which, on the
whole, I have most thoroughly and heartily enjoyed.
I hoped then that I had not done with my beloved Kerry,
and my association with that great kingdom has indeed been
lifelong. I have always understood the feeling of the Irish
emigrants who have had sods of their native earth sent out to
them to the New World, Heimweh is after all a good thing,
and Kerry to me would always seem to be appealing, however
far I had roamed.
CHAPTER V
LAND AGENT IN CORK
Had I been able to obtain a reasonably large farm near
Dingle, I should never have become a land agent, and I
most certainly should never have given evidence before
any Commission,
In default of adequate land accommodation, I embarked
on my profession by becoming assistant land agent to my
brother-in-law, the Knight of Kerry, who was agent to Sir
George Colthurst. I lived with the Knight at Inniscarra in
County Cork, not far from Blarney.
From that time onward I worked steadily, and as I take
my ease at the Carlton to-day, I really feel I have done as
much honest labour in my career as has any man.
In proof I may cite a day's record some years later, taken
almost at random from my diary.
I began with an hour in my Cork office, went by train to
Killarney, a journey of three and a half hours, where I spent
three hours in my office, and then by train on to Tralee, a
further one and a quarter hours, where I had an hour and a
half in my office in that town, and then drove out to Edenburn,
seven miles, to sleep. That done fairly often makes a decided
strain on endurance and mental concentration, because the
affairs at each place were of course for different landlords and
needed the memorising of a fresh section of business all
absolutely intrusted to me, whilst the train service in Kerry
38
LAND AGENT IN CORK 39
then and now is not calculated to promote mental tranquillity
or facilitate business.
Having alluded to my diary, I had better explain that I
kept no journal until 1852, and subsequently to that year
it consisted merely of bald memoranda of my movements ;
therefore it has not been of the least use in preparing
these reminiscences.
In 1846 I became a Government Inspector of Land
Improvements and Drainage Works, and in that capacity
went to Bantry, where I saw the appalling destitution caused
by the famine, with which I shall deal in the next chapter.
I had made application for this post before I left Kerry,
directly I had found my farm too small for my requirements,
and I received the appointment from the Chairman of the
Irish Board of Works. Practically speaking the pay was
about a pound a day with allowances.
This post in no way interfered with my duties as a land
agent then, but I afterwards resigned it owing to the increasing
exigencies of my profession.
It may be as well to detail for readers other than Irish
what are the avocations of a land agent, especially as the class
in Ireland will probably soon be as extinct as the dodo.
The duties of an Irish land agent comprise a great deal
of office work, drawing up agreements with tenants, receiving
rent, superintending agricultural and all landlords' improve-
ments, sitting as magistrate and representing the landlord
when the latter is absent at poor-law meetings, road sessions,
and on grand juries.
With very rare exceptions the salary has been five per
cent, on the rents received. So the agent has been paid five
per cent, on all the money he has put into the landlord's
pockets, whilst an architect has always received five per cent.
40 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
on all he took out of them, an arrangement which in the latter
instance has not worked at all well for the landlords.
The tendency has gradually been to consolidate and
amalgamate land agencies, for as the difficulty of getting rents
increased, more competent men of experience and judgment
were needed by the landlords. As a proof of the trust reposed
in me, I may mention that at one time I received the rents of
one-fifth of the whole county of Kerry — and that in the worst
times.
Such a task is not one to be envied, however joyously a
man may take up the burden of his daily toil, and of course
the agents as the outward and visible signs of the distant or
absentee landlords obtained the greater share of the hatred felt
for the latter.
In the worst period Lord Derby received threats that if he
did not reduce his rents, his agent would be murdered.
He coolly replied : —
' If you think you will intimidate me by shooting my agent
you are greatly mistaken.'
That is exactly the reply the agents desired the landlords
to make, but it did not conduce to making their own existences
any the more secure or enviable.
Of course in the due working out of the Wyndham Act,
land agents will be utterly ruined.
There are no openings for them because they are too old
to commence learning another profession, and they will not
get employment under the County Council because they
belong to the landlord class and have unflinchingly fought
the battles of the landlords.
The agents are a class who have devoted their time and
risked their lives in order to get in the rents due to their
employers, and there is not the smallest chance — save in a
LAND AGENT IN CORK 41
few isolated and exceptional cases — of their being kept on
when the landlords will have only their own demesne in their
own hands and employ some underling, such as a bailiff in
England, to collect the stray rents of the few cottagers who
may still chance to be tenants.
Judge Ross stated that there was no more deserving or
painstaking class in Ireland than the land agents, and he con-
sidered it a great hardship that under the Wyndham Act
they obtain no compensation.
By agreement in most cases they receive three per cent, of
the purchase money, but that is a very poor sinking fund to
provide for a middle-aged gentleman, who has probably a
family to support ; and absolute bankruptcy must be the result
if there is, as on several large properties, an agent with a
couple of assistants.
When the Ashbourne Act was passed in 1885, it was
never contemplated that the purchases would be on a whole-
sale scale. As a matter of fact only a few estates were sold,
and on the purchase price of one of those for which I was
agent I received two per cent. It should be also borne in
mind that the profession of a land agent in Ireland is
on a far higher social plane than in England. In many
cases the younger son or brother of the landlord is the
agent for the family property ; and in some instances this
has worked uncommonly well. In other cases, gentlemen
by birth conducted the business, or else the administration
of several estates was consolidated and carried on from one
office. *
In every case the billet was regarded as one for life, only
forfeited by gross misconduct, and the relations between land-
lord and agent have been nearly always of an intimate and
cordial character. Each agent began as an assistant, obtaining
42 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
an independent post by selection and influence, and few entered
the profession unless they had reasonable prospects of a definite
post on their own account in due course.
In my time the landlord was the sole judge of the agent's
qualifications, but the profession has become a branch of the
Engineering Surveyor's Institution.
As may be imagined, there are now remarkably few
candidates for the necessary examinations, because it is virtually
annihilated.
Things were very different when I embarked without
mistrust on a career which has landed me comfortably into
my eighties, although under Government every appointment
has to be compulsorily vacated at the age of sixty-five. No
one starting now could anticipate any such result in old age,
and so without affectation I can say autres temps autres m^urs,
which may be freely translated as ' present times much the
worst.'
More pleasant is it to turn to a few brief memories of
Cork. It was a cheerful place at the time I am speaking
of, for there was plenty of entertaining and truly genial
hospitality. The general depression caused by famine, fever,
and Fenians hardly affected the great town, and after those
funereal shadows had once passed, Cork was as gay as any
one could reasonably desire.
The townsfolk are very witty and clever at giving nick-
names, as the following little tales will show.
When a citizen in Cork makes money, he generally builds
a house, and the higher up the hill his house is situated, the
more is thought of him.
Mr. Doneghan, a highly respectable tallow chandler, built
a fine residence early in the nineteenth century, which he called
Waterloo.
LAND AGENT IN CORK 43
The populace said it should have been named Talavera
(i.e. Tallow-vera), and as that it is known to this day.
Mr. Maguire, who was Member for Cork, and Lord
Mayor of the City into the bargain, was very influential in the
promotion of a gas company. With the money he made out
of it, he reared a rather lofty mansion, which was promptly
christened the Lighthouse.
All butter in Cork is sold at the wharves, and the casks
are branded with the quality of the butter they contain. One
man made a fortune out of the first class butter on its merits,
and out of the sixth class butter, which he put in the first class
casks and sold on the testimony of the brand on the wood.
This became in time notorious to most people except the more
unsophisticated of his clients, and when he embarked on bricks
and mortar his house was generally known as Brandenburg.
One more and I have done with these baptismal sobriquets.
A lady on a Queenstown steamer had put her foot down
the bunker's hole, and broke her ankle through the accident.
She brought an action against the company, duly proved
negligence on the part of the employes, and obtained sub-
stantial damages. These considerably assisted her in erecting
a rather attractive mansion, which she decidedly resented being
called Bunker's Hill.
Some people have their own ideas about the definition of
a gentleman, as a certain rather diminutive racing man found
to his cost.
It was at a meeting close to Cork, and he was standing
next a burly farmer close to the rails when the horses were
nearly ready to start.
Pointing to one disreputable -looking ruffian about to
mount, he observed : —
' That fellow has no pretensions to be a gentleman-rider.'
44 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
The farmer caught him by the collar of his coat and the
seat of his breeches, and shook him as a mastiff would a rat.
* Mind yourself, small man,' said he, * that 's a recognised
gentleman in these parts.'
There was a mighty shindy, and when the farmer was told
his victim was a prominent English peer, he retorted : —
' Well, that won't make him a judge of an Irish gentleman.*
In the last chapter I mentioned that the preacher I most
admired was Archbishop Magee. I had the privilege of
frequently hearing him in Cork, where he drew crowded
congregations to a temporary church — the cathedral being
under repair.
I never heard any one who so magnetised me from the
pulpit, and I am by no means prone to admire sermons. There
was a sort of mesmerism in the very eloquence of Magee which
kept my eyes riveted on his lips — rather big, bulgy lips in an
expressive, sensitive face. An hour beneath him sped mar-
vellously fast, and more than once in Cork I have heard him
preach for that length. The impression he made on me has
never been effaced, and it was with no surprise I learnt in due
course that he became Archbishop of York.
The late Lord Derby said that the most eloquent speech
he ever heard in or out of the House of Lords was Magee's
speech on the Church Act, the peroration of which — quoting
from memory after many years — ran : — ' My Lords, I will
not, I cannot, and I dare not vote for that most unhallowed
bill which lies on your Lordships' table.'
Have all Magee stories been told ?
I am afraid so. Yet in the hope that a few may be new to
some, though old to others — who are invited to skip them —
here are just a small batch.
When he was a dean, he one day attended a debate on
LAND AGENT IN CORK 45
tithes in the House of Commons, and was subsequently
putting on his overcoat, when a Radical Member courteously-
assisted him, whereupon he remarked : — -
' I am very much obliged to you, sir, for reversing the
policy of your friends inside, who are taking the coats off our
backs.'
This was equalled by the wife of an Irish landlord who
lost her purse in the Ladies' Gallery of the House of
Commons.
Mrs. Gladstone, who had been sitting next her, after
kindly assisting in the ineffectual search, observed : —
' I hope there was not much in it.'
' No, it was a nice little purse I had had for a long time,
but thanks to your husband there was nothing in it.'
An Irish story of Magee's concerns an Orange clergyman
in Fermanagh, who asked leave to preach a sermon by Magee.
Now, this clergyman, who was an ambitious man, was rather
ashamed of his mother, and would not let her live at the
parsonage, but had taken lodgings for her in the town.
Magee, moreover, always a moderate man, did not like Orange
sermons, and most certainly had never composed one. As he
good naturedly did not want to offend the other, he said he
would give him a capital sermon to deliver if he — Magee—
might select the text.
' Of course, of course,' assented the other ; ' what is it.? '
' " From that time His disciple took her to his own house." '
Even this was hardly so cutting as his remark, when a
bishop, to a clergyman of whom he did not think highly, but
who upbraided him for not giving him a living.
' Sir, if it were raining livings, the utmost I could do
would be to lend you an umbrella.'
Mention of Magee suggests an ecclesiastical tale concerning
46 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
a most convivial attorney — George Faith by name — who had
rather a red nose, which he explained was caused by wearing
tight boots.
His father in old age got married a second time, and
George was asked why his stepmother was like Dr. Newman.
The answer was because she had embraced the ancient
Faith.
Among old time Irish members, Joe Ronayne, M.P. for
Cork, was among the most diverting.
He was a railway contractor, and much wanted some
additional ground at the terminus of the line, which the
proprietor. Lord Ventry, would not sell.
The size of the coveted patch was only seven feet long by
three broad. Mr. Ronayne grimly retorted : —
' That 's very strange, for it is exactly the amount of
ground I 'd like to give him,' i.e. for his grave.
Another experience of Ronayne's was to the following tune.
He had obtained advances from a local bank for his rail-
way contract to the satisfaction of both parties, and when
asked by the manager for some wrinkles about the making
of a railway, replied : —
' The best thing is to run it into a soft bank.'
He was a plucky chap as well as a witty one, for owing to
some internal malady, from which he died, he had to have his
leg amputated, at the same time resigning his seat for Cork.
Addressing the surgeon, he observed : —
' I cannot stand for the borough any longer, but I shall
certainly stump the constituency as a county candidate.'
Poor fellow, he was all too soon an accepted candidate for
his passage over to the great majority.
A certain attorney named Nagle used to do most of his
work.
LAND AGENT IN CORK 47
Speaking of another attorney this Nagle remarked : —
' He has the heart of a vulture.'
' I know what 's worse,' was Ronayne's comment.
' Indeed ! '
' Yes ; the bill of an aigle ' (which is the broad Cork
pronunciation of eagle).
This Nagle was not remarkable for the extent of his
ablutions.
At one period, when he was becoming an ardent Radical,
an obsequious toady said : —
' You '11 become a second Marat.'
' There 's no fear that he will die in the same place,'
promptly came from Ronayne.
On another occasion the two were waiting for the judges
outside their lodgings during the Assizes.
Suddenly Ronayne, in the hearing of a number of acquaint-
ances, called out : —
' You had better come away at once, Nagle.*
' Why should I .'' ' indignantly.
' If you stop five minutes longer there 's a shower of rain
coming on and you might get washed.'
On a third occasion, Nagle told Ronayne he was going to
invest some money In a mining exploration.
' Explore your own landed property, my dear fellow,' was
Ronayne's advice.
' But you know I have not got any.'
* Good Heavens, you don't mean to say you have cleaned
your nails ? '
Though he was an out-and-out Fenian, Ronayne was as
honest a man as I ever met, and he was considered one of the
most amusing men in the House of Commons.
The attorneys in Cork at one time formed quite a small
48 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
coterie, who divided all the business until it grew too much for
them, one, Mr. Paul Wallace, being especially harassed with
briefs.
At length a barrister named Graves came down from
Dublin, and was introduced to Wallace by another attorney
with the remark : —
' Counsel are very necessary.'
' Yes,' said Wallace ; * as a matter of fact, we are all being
driven to our graves.'
At Kanturk Sessions, Mr. Philip O'Connell was consulted
by a client about the recovery of a debt. He at once saw
that the defence would be a pleading of the statute of limita-
tions, so he told his client that if he could get a man to swear
that the debtor had admitted the debt within the last six years,
he would succeed, but not otherwise.
O'Connell went off to take the chair at a Bar dinner to a
new County Court judge.
As the dessert was being set on the table, a loud knock
came at the door, which was immediately behind the chairman.
' What is it ^ ' cried O'Connell.
A head appeared, and the voice from it explained : —
' I 'm Tim Flaherty, your honour, as was consulting you
outside, and I want you to come this way for a while.'
' Don't you see I am engaged and cannot come ? '
' But it 's pressing and important.'
' I tell you I won't come.'
Then at the top of his voice Tim yelled : —
' Will a small woman do as well, your honour .'' '
The members of the Bar present, quite unaware of the
previous conversation, exploded in a shout of laughter, and it
was long before O'Connell heard the last of the invidious
construction they put on the affair.
LAND AGENT IN CORK 49
One of the interesting people I came across in the
vicinity of Cork was Mr. Jeffreys, who up to his death in
1862 was the most enterprising and experimental landed
proprietor in the county. He imported Scottish stewards,
and people from far and near came to see his farms.
I should say that in the fifties he did more for agriculture
than any other one man who could be named in Ireland.
He often said to me : —
* The system of small farms will not last long in Ireland,
for the occupiers are sure to strike against rents.'
He did not live to see the fulfilment of his prophecy, but
its effects were felt by his grandson, Sir George Colthurst,
who inherited his property.
Most of his stories were very improper, but their wit
excused them.
In the Kildare Street Club one day he saw a very pompous
individual, and asked who he was.
* That 's So-and-So, and the odd thing is he is the youngest
of four brothers, who are all married without having a child
between them.'
' Ah, that accounts for his importance — he is the last of
the Barons.'
, Finding him very meditative in the County Club at Cork
one Friday, I asked him what was the matter.
' I am making my soul,' said he. ' I began my dinner
with turbot and ended with scollops.'
CHAPTER VI
FAMINE AND FEVER
It is now necessary to revert to that terrible page of Irish
history, the famine, which culminated in what is still known as
* the black forty-seven.'
I have often been asked, ' How is it that Ireland could
formerly support a population of eight millions as compared
with only five now ? '
The answer is simple : Eight millions could still exist if the
potato crop were a certainty, and if the people were now
content to exist as they did then. But to the then existing
population — living at best in a light-hearted and hopeful, hand-
to-mouth contentment — there was a terrible awakening.
The mysterious blight, which had affected the potato
in America in 1844, had not been felt in Ireland, where
the harvest for 1845 promised to be singularly abundant.
Suddenly, almost without warning, the later crop shrivelled -
and wasted.
The poor had a terribly hard winter, and the farmers
borrowed heavily to have means to till a larger amount of
land in 1846.
Once more the early prospects were admirable, and then in
a single night whole districts were blighted.
This is how Mr. Steuart Trench described the cata-
strophe : —
'On August I, 1846, I was startled by a sudden and
50
FAMINE AND FEVER 51
strange rumour that all the potato fields in the district were
blighted, and that a stench had arisen emanating from their
decaying stalk. The report was true, the stalks being
withered ; and a new, strange stench was to be noticed which
became a well-known feature in ' the blight ' for years after.
On being dug up it was found that the potato was rapidly
blackening and melting away. The stench generally was the
first indication, the withered leaf following in a day or two.'
The terrible sufferings which ensued were complicated by
some blunders of British statesmen.
In 1845 Sir Robert Peel was Prime Minister. He
imported Indian meal, and established depots in the country,
where it was sold to the people at the lowest possible price,
thus putting a complete check on private enterprise.
In 1846 Lord John Russell was Premier. He declined to
follow the example of Sir Robert Peel, because he considered
that it interfered with Free Trade, and, reversing the policy of
his predecessor, announced that he left the importation of meal
to private enterprise.
But capitalists having been alarmed, meal was not imported
in sufficient quantities, with the result that Indian corn rose to
eighteen pounds a ton, when it might have been laid in at
• the rate of eight pounds a ton.
Had Lord John Russell's policy come first, and that of
Sir Robert Peel subsequently, the result would have been very
different.
The fight over the Corn Law question in England at the
time was decidedly an injury to Ireland, because the Pro-
tectionists minimised the danger of famine in the winter of
1845 for fear of the calamity being made a pretext for
Free Trade.
Dealing with an unforeseen calamity of such stupendous
52 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
magnitude at long range from Downing Street entailed
delay ; and public relief, waiting until official investigation
had tardily reported the hardships, suffered in the truly
distressful country.
The state of things round Bantry, of which I had accurate
knowledge, was appalling. I knew of twenty-three deaths in
the poorhouse in twenty-four hours. Again, on a relief road,
two hours after I had passed, on my ride home I saw three of
the poor fellows stretched corpses on the stones they had been
breaking.
The Registrar-General for Ireland, Mr William Donelly,
officially stated that five hundred thousand one-roomed cabins
had disappeared between the census before the famine and the
one after it.
Whole families used to starve in their cabins without their
plight being discovered until the stench of their decaying corpses
attracted notice.
Some superstition also prevented even the children from
eating the myriads of blackberries which ripened on the
bushes.
Directly the calamity was comprehended, the English
poured money into the country with unbounded generosity,
but the management was bad.
The relief works organised by the Government took the
form of draining and road-making. This entailed delay,
owing to the preliminary surveying, and when employment
could be given, the people were too emaciated and feeble to
work. All over Ireland unfinished roads leading half way to
places of no consequence are to-day grass-grown memorials
of that ghastly effort of State assistance.
Almost the earliest of the private soup-kitchens for the
relief of the sufferers was that opened at Dingle under the
FAMINE AND FEVER 53
joint initiative of Lady Ventry, Mrs. Hickson, my future
mother-in-law, and Mrs. Hussey, my mother. So as not to
pauperise the people, subscriptions of one penny a week were
asked from every house in the town. At ten in the morning
those who wanted it could get a pint per head of really
excellent soup for themselves and their families. Those who
were known to be able to pay had to contribute a penny ; the
really destitute had gratuitous relief.
So bad was the famine that people coming in from the
country fell in the street never to rise again. One woman
was found lying on the outskirts of the town almost dead
from starvation, her three children having succumbed beside
her, and had she not been carried to the soup-kitchen she
would not have survived them many hours.
My wife well remembers another case. One day her
mother emerged from a cabin carrying what looked like a big
bundle of clothes. It was the form of an emaciated woman,
whose four children and husband had all starved. My
mother-in-law took her to her own house, fed her at first
with spoonsful of soup, and kept her there until she had rebuilt
her once vigorous constitution.
My wife subsequently recollects her as a hale, buxom,
young widow coming to say good-bye before emigrating to
America.
Very soon all the coffins had been exhausted, and in many
places the dead were taken to the graves and dropped in
through the hinged bottom of a trap-coffin.
After soup had been introduced, Indian meal stirabout
proved efficacious, and it was distributed from large iron
boilers set up by the roadside to the gaunt, cadaverous wretches
who scuffled for the sustenance.
Even more terrible than those privations was the fever
54 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
which supervened. Apart from the Jack of food, a great
cause of mortality lay in the change of diet. Potatoes form a
bulky article of food, and stirabout, unless very carefully
made, used to swell after it was consumed. Many, too, ate
raw turnips from sheer destitution, and these also caused
swelling of the stomach as well as a dysentery almost always
fatal in a few days.
Numbers of starving Catholics had gone to Protestant
clergymen and offered to become converts in return for food,
and when some of these sickened with the fever, the priests
declared it was a judgment on them, and religious hostility
became intensified.
At Dingle Lady Ventry and her helpers were denounced
from the pulpits as ' benevolent sisters bent on superising the
poor ' — to superise being the improvised verb for Protestant-
ising, a thing they decidedly did not attempt.
A very early instance of the open-air cure never before
recorded took place at Lismore. When every possible place
in the hospital had been filled with fever patients, a number
had to be lodged in a disused quarry near the Blackwater, and
of the latter not a single sufferer died, though the mortality
within doors was excessive.
I remember one rather quaint incident.
A large amount of sea biscuit was brought into a house
for distribution by a benevolent gentleman. His daughter,
aged seven, surreptitiously stole a biscuit for the purpose of
eating it. But at the first attempt to bite the tough thing,
out came a loose tooth. She howled with fright, thinking it
a judgment on her for her misdeed, and went in tears to tell
her mother.
I have always hoped the latter had enough sense of
humour to laugh at the incident, but my shrewd suspicion
FAMINE AND FEVER S5
is that she improved the occasion — an error for which there
is always temptation, and on which there is often the retri-
bution of the few words having the opposite effect to that
intended.
The conduct of the landlords during the famine and fever
has been much discussed and variously represented. But
many of the Nationalists themselves have -declared that the
diatribes of their comrades have been thoroughly undeserved.
Absenteeism apart — for which no excuse need be attempted —
the Irish landlords did their best, gave of their substance, and
imperilled their own lives for the sake of the sufferers. Mr.
Richard White of Inchiclogh, near Bantry, fell a victim to the
fever. Two other landlords who gave their lives for others
were Mr. Richard Martin, M.P., and Mr. Nolan of Ballin-
derry. The conditions of tenure did not admit of lavish
financial generosity, but as one of their sharpest critics in later
times admitted, the vast majority ' went down with the ship.'
The survivors of this terrible time numbered heroes drawn
from all classes of life ; and it would have been well if the
lesson of universal charity then practically demonstrated had
been allowed to sink into all hearts.
Instead I will quote the following extract from John
Mitchel's History of Ireland, a thick, paper-bound volume,
which, at the price of eighteenpence, has circulated enormously
among the Irish, not only at home, but in Glasgow and
America.
On page 243 : — ' That million and a half of men, women,
and children were carefully, prudently, and peacefully slain *
[the italics are those of Mitchel] * by the English Government.
They died of hunger in the midst of abundance which their
own hands created ; and it is quite immaterial to distinguish
those who perished in the agonies of famine itself from those
56 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
who died by typhus fever, which in Ireland is always caused
by famine.
* Further, this was strictly an artificial famine — that is to
say, it was a famine which desolated a rich and fertile island
that produced every year abundance and superabundance to
sustain all her people and many more. The English, indeed,
call that famine a dispensation of Providence, and ascribe it
entirely to the blight of the potatoes. But potatoes failed in
like manner all over Europe, yet there was no famine save in
Ireland. The British account of the matter, then, is first a
fraud ; second, a blasphemy. The Almighty, indeed, sent the
potato blight, but the English created the famine.'
Such pestilential perversion of truth is freely circulated and
firmly believed, for contradiction never penetrates to those
gulled by these lies. In America the gutter press section of
journalism is esteemed at its true worth, and is as harmless as
a few squibs. In Ireland what is seen in bad print is always
believed, and is corroborated by the lower class of priest.
When I say so much I am simply indicating a national sore, but it
needs a wiser physician than myself to apply a successful remedy.
Perhaps with the spread of education may arise the same
power to discriminate between the true and false published in
the papers that is a characteristic of both the English and
Scottish. As it is, the Irishman believes whatever he reads in
print ; and in most cases the solitary paper that he reads is one
full of treason and untruths.
When the famine took place, the Irish fled as from a
plague to America, and when they landed there both men and
women were the prey of every blackguard without a single
person to advise or protect them.
Had the Government taken the movement in hand and
employed agents at New York to provide for them until they
FAMINE AND FEVER 57
obtained employment, and to direct them where to apply for
it, England would to-day probably have had a grateful nation
on the other side of the Atlantic. Instead, we have a hostile
multitude which neglects no opportunity of voting for any
politician hostile to Great Britain ; and this disaffection sadly
militates against that union of Anglo-Saxon hearts, which is
so freely accepted by journalists and politicians as a sort of
millennium.
Miss Cobbe related a story about a steady-going girl who
had received money from her sister who was doing well in
New York to pay her passage money out.
She told Miss Cobbe how she had been to an emigration
office and booked her passage.
' Direct to New York, of course.'
' Well no, Miss. But to some place close by, New some-
thing else.*
' New something else near New York ? '
' Yes ; I disremember what it was, but he said it was quite
handy for New York.'
' Not New Orleans, surely ? '
* Yes, Miss, that was it. New Orleans, quite near New
York,' he said.
The scoundrelly agent had taken her passage money and
sent her off absolutely friendless to New Orleans, where she
died of a fever in less than a year.
Many of the three million emigrants after the famine must
have been as easily duped.
A considerable time ago (but if I were in Kerry I could
give the date from my diary, because I met the man at a
dinner given at the St. James's Club by Lord Kenmare's
son-in-law, Mr. Douglas) one of the big New World railway
companies sent over an emissary to the British Government.
58 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
He was charged to offer to take every distressed man in
Ireland, with his priest — if he would go — piper, cat, wife,
sister, mother, and children, to the land through which the
great railway ran. Each man was to be given a log-house
with three rooms, one hundred and sixty acres, ten of them
under cultivation, and no residence was to be more than ten
miles from a railway station. All that was asked in return
was a loan for ten years without interest to cover the expenses
of transportation.
I rather think Mr. Chichester Fortescue was the Chief
Secretary. Anyhow, whoever occupied that post urged the
Cabinet to accept the offer. The conclave wavered, but
Mr. Gladstone firmly vetoed the idea. He was afraid the
plan would be unpopular with the priests, who would see
themselves bereft of the favourite members of their con-
gregations.
Instead of this admirable scheme, we have ever since had
the pitiable sight of the parents, the sisters, and the sweetheart
crooning over the emigration of the best able-bodied young
men from Ireland.
No one who has heard the keening and wailing, say at
Limerick Junction, over Paddy going over the water will
forget the appealing sorrow of the scene, the sound of which
rings long in one's ears after the train has gone out of sight.
The emigrant has been the theme of song and story. He
has also been one of the finest recruits of the United States,
whilst he is a stigma on English politics, and a drain on the
land which in all Europe can least afford to spare him.
Mr. Wyndham's new Act will not arrest emigration, indeed
it will probably increase it.
At present the landlord is often able to put pressure on
his tenants to give employment to respectable men. But the
FAMINE AND FEVER 59
small farmer is certain to use as few men as possible. You
can see the analogy in contemporary France. Therefore more
families will see the pride of their cabins starting for the New
World.
Perhaps what I am proudest of, was being called in an
address in Kerry ' the poor man's friend,' for it is what I have
always striven to be.
But if I were to be a young man to-morrow, instead of
a day older than I am to-day, I should be powerless to merit
such a title in years to come.
And the reason, as I have just indicated, is the fault of the
Government.
I sometimes think the canniest man of whom I ever heard
was the old Scottish minister who was accustomed to preface
his extempore petition with the words : —
* My britheren, let us noo pray that the High Court of
Parliament winna do ony harm.'
CHAPTER VII
FENIANISM
I AM quite aware the opinion I am about to deliver will cause
great surprise, but I give it after mature consideration, sup-
ported by all my knowledge of Ireland.
It is this : —
The old Fenianism was politically of little account, socially
of no danger, except to a few individuals who could be easily
protected, and has been grossly exaggerated, either wilfully or
through ignorance.
Matters were very different after Mr. Gladstone, by
successive acts, of what I maintain were criminal legislation,
deliberately fostered treason and encouraged outrage in
Ireland.
Irish agitation would never have reached genuine im-
portance unless it had been steadily assisted in its noisome
growth by the so-called Grand Old Man, at whose grave may
be laid every calamity which has affected Ireland since it had
the misfortune to arouse his interest, and the ill effects of
whose demoralising interference will bear fruit for many years
to come.
This is set down in sober earnest and in as unprejudiced a
spirit as it is possible for any sincerely patriotic — using the
word in its true and not in its debased meaning — Irishman to
feel when he is thoroughly acquainted with all the niceties of
the national history for the past sixty years.
60
FENIANISM 6 1
I am far from saying that subsequent British cabinets have
always understood the Irish questions, but they are at least
only reaping the whirlwind where Mr. Gladstone sowed the
wind.
I would broadly characterise as Fenian every Irish out-
break or ebullition in the nineteenth century up to the time
of the baneful influence of the man who conducted the
Midlothian campaign.
Half the tumultuous efforts of the earlier movements
would have been rendered ridiculous had it been possible to
have them contemporaneously examined by a few special cor-
respondents. I can imagine the representative of the Daily
Mail finding material for very few sensational headlines in
the Whiteboys Insurrection.
As for the tales of single-handed terrorism, these in Ireland
did nursery duty to alarm imaginative children, just as the
adventures of Dick Turpin and Jack Sheppard or the kid-
napping of heirs by gipsies serve as stories to thrill English
little ones.
Of course in 1789 to have killed three Protestants was
counted a passport into heaven in the vicinity of Vinegar
Hill. But Father Matthew's temperance crusade was worth
more salvation to the nation, and mere threatening letters
count for nothing. I have had over one hundred in my time,
yet I '11 die in my bed for all that.
My father-in-law had a pretty solid contempt for the
Whiteboys — not the original breed, but those who assumed
the title in Kerry early in the nineteenth century.
He was told that these miscreants had a plan to surround
his house that night and to shoot everybody in it, and at that
very moment they were confabulating at a certain farmhouse.
Refusing to be escorted or guarded, he made his way to
62 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
that farm, and walking into the kitchen, rated the lot of them
in unmeasured terms.
Cowed and abashed they listened to him as he threatened
the law, hell, and the devil alone knows what beside. Finally,
pistol in hand, he bade them produce their arms and put them
in his dog-cart.
This they actually did — for they had imbibed no liquor
to give them false pluck — and, with a final curse, he whipped
up his horse and drove away ' with all their teeth ' to the
barracks, where he left a very useful arsenal, and was never
troubled by one of them again.
To thus obtain complete immunity by sheer coolness is as
much a matter of personal magnetism as anything else. An
instance of this, which impressed me much, occurred in a coiner-
ghost story told by Mr, T, P. O'Connor, which I venture to
quote,
' The hero was no less a person than Marshal Saxe. One
night, on the march, he bivouacked in a haunted castle, and
slept the sleep of the brave until midnight, when he was
awakened by hideous howls heralding the approach of the
spectre. When it appeared, the Marshal first discharged his
pistol point-blank at it without effect, and then struck it with his
sabre, which was shivered in his hand. The invulnerable spectre
then beckoned the amazed Marshal to follow, and preceded
him to a spot where the floor of the gallery suddenly yawned,
and they sank together through it to sepulchral depths. Here
he was surrounded by a band of desperate coiners who would
forthwith have made away with him if the Marshal had not told
them who he was, and warned them that if he disappeared his
army would dig to the earth's centre to find him, and would
infallibly find and finish every one of them.
'"If I am reconducted to my chamber by this steel-clad
FENIANISM 63
spectre and allowed to sleep undisturbed until morning, I
promise never to relate this adventure while any harm can
happen to you by my telling it."
' To this the coiners after consultation agreed. He was led
back to bed, and next morning ridiculed all spectral stories to
his officers. It was not until the world of coiners was finally
broken up that he related his experiences.'
In that story I wonder who went bail for the Marshal's
truth. Veracity and gallantry may not have gone hand in
hand, or perhaps they were affianced, and therefore took care
not to come near one another.
Another sort of gallantry was noteworthy in what was
known as Young Ireland, for in ' the set ' were several ladies,
Eva, Mary, and Speranza, all prone to write seditious verse.
Eva was Miss Mary Kelly, daughter of a Galway gentleman,
who promised her lover to wait while he underwent ten years
penal servitude, and kept her word, marrying him at Kings-
town two days after his release. ' Mary ' was Miss Ellen
Downing, whose lover was also a fugitive after the out-
break ; but he proved unfaithful, and she was one of the
last I heard of who died of pining away. It used to be much
talked of in my young days. Perhaps now that it is not, it
more often occurs. ' Speranza ' was Lady Wilde, a fluent
poet and essayist, who survived her husband the archasologist.
One of her children inherited much of her talent, but bears a
chequered fame. I always thought the wit of Oscar Wilde
anything but Irish, and was always glad it possessed no
national attributes — unless impudence was one.
At one of his own first nights in London (I think it was
on the occasion of the production of y^n Ideal Husband at the
Haymarket) he was summoned before the curtain by the
customary shouts for ' Author, author.'
64 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
He stood there for a moment amid the cheering, and then,
in response to cries for a speech, calmly took a cigarette case
out of his pocket, selected one of the contents, and, having
very deliberately lighted it, said : —
' Ladies and gentlemen, I do not know what you have
done, but I have spent a very pleasant evening with my own
play. Good night.'
His brother, known as ' WufFalo Will ' among his friends,
is the hero of many stories.
Once he went up to a policeman and said : —
' Which is the way to heaven .? '
' I don't know, sir ; better ask a parson.'
' What do you think I pay taxes for ? It 's your business
to be able to tell me the way to heaven. As for the bally
parsons, they don't understand.'
A broad smile came over the constable's face.
' Were you asking where you could get blind drunk
comfortably, sir ? because if so ■'
And out came the hint with a wink.
Wilde was fond of that tale at one time.
The affair of ' '48 ' was a farce. Stimulated by the
French Revolution, John Mitchel wrote rabid sedition, but
received short shrift at the hands of the Government, who
arrested him, sentenced him to fourteen years' transportation,
and almost from the dock he was taken manacled in a police
van, escorted by cavalry, and put on board a steamer, which
at once put out to sea.
Smith O'Brien was the leader of this feeble insurrection.
He had boasted he would be at the head of fifty thousand
Tipperary men. Instead his army consisted of a few hundred
half-clad ragamuffins, which attacked a squad of police who
took refuge in a farmhouse, and easily routed the rabble.
FENIANISM 65
Smith O'Brien proved himself an arrant coward. He hid
in a cabbage garden, and is still believed to have made his
temporary escape from the police in the habit of an Anglican
sisterhood, of which his sister, Hon. Mrs. Monsell, was
Mother Superior.
The bigger outbreak was not a bit more serious. It was
all trumped up by the Irish in America, and their reliance
upon help from American soldiers was destroyed after the
war. This agitation was the one known as the work of the
Phoenix Society, and the object was the separation of Ireland
from England and the confiscation of Irish property.
The leaders were James Stephens, who had nearly escaped
being shot by a policeman in the Smith O'Brien campaign, and
that indomitable scoundrel O'Donovan Rossa. It was at this
time we began to hear of mysterious strangers. In this case it
was Stephens ; later Parnell wrapped himself in strange isolation ;
and subsequently Tynan, who was known as 'Number One.'
Cork and Kerry were the chosen parts of Ireland for the
new Fenianism to come to a head, and a certain amount of
enrolling and drilling did take place,
I was then residing within two miles of the city of Cork,
arid one night the Fenians came out and encamped all round
my house, without offering the slightest molestation or injury
to anybody.
Two Fenians walked into the house of my stableman, about
a quarter of a mile from my own, and asked for food, saying
they were ready to pay for it.
The woman replied that she had no food in the house, but
the breakfast of her brother Charles, which she was about to
take to him in the stables.
They wanted to pay her a shilling for it, but she declined,
and then they went away quietly.
ee REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
The principal outbreak was to be in Killarney, and they
plotted to attack the police barrack at Cahirciveen, because
they had an ally in the son of the head constable.
But a man in the town, to whom he had shown kindness,
warned the head constable of the attack, which in the end
consisted of a few shots fired by a ragged rabble of about three
hundred, half of whom were half-hearted, and the other half
half-drunk.
The coastguards manned their boat and rowed off to a
gunboat in the harbour to ask for some marines ; and the
moment this was known to the besiegers they dispersed.
Some of them marched rather downcast towards Killarney,
and on the road they met a mounted policeman riding to warn
Cahirciveen of the attack which was to be made against the
barracks, for every movement of this silly rebellion was known
to the Government.
They called on the man to stop and deliver up his
despatches. He declined to do so, and so soon as he had
ridden on they shot him in the back, wounding him badly.
He recovered, but was very shabbily treated by the
Government, who only awarded him a miserably small pen-
sion, a niggardly act which aroused much dissatisfaction.
The Roman Catholic Bishop of Killarney, Doctor
Moriarty, protested strongly against the cowardice of the
Fenians, who were afraid to face one armed man, and waited
until his back was turned before they shot him.
However, as I have indicated, the Fenian movement was
very insignificant, and was known in all its aspects to the
Government, which dealt pretty roughly with it.
It is a singular fact that in the Fenian councils Killarney
should have been selected for the outbreak.
This is a town where nearly all the landed proprietors
FENIANISM 67
were Roman Catholics, where there was a Catholic Bishop, a
monastery and two convents, while one half-ruined Protestant
church sufficed to accommodate the few worshippers who sat
under a dreary, inoffensive vicar on a very small salary. All
reasonable folk, moreover, know that Killarney is the town to
which, more than any other in Ireland, it is important to attract
British tourists.
It was well known that some of the promoters and
instigators of the movement betrayed it before its very
inception to the Government ; and Bishop Moriarty, from
his pulpit, in his sermon alluded in no measured language to
those criminals who instigated the innocent peasants to play a
part in this mock insurrection, and then betrayed them.
He concluded : —
' It may be a hard saying, but surely hell is not too hot
nor eternity too long for the punishment of such villainy.'
Yet the whole of Irish history is disfigured by the
poisonous trail of the insidious informer.
I was in Kerry at the time of the Cahirciveen fizzle, in the
neighbourhood of Dingle, and it was rumoured that the
insurrection was to be general.
That was not my opinion, for I travelled on an open car
by myself, with a large quantity of money, and no other
weapon than an umbrella.
It was a very different state of affairs in the distress caused
by Mr. Gladstone's legislation, for then I never travelled
without a revolver, and occasionally was accompanied by a
Winchester rifle. I used to place my revolver as regularly
beside my fork on the dinner-table, either in my own or in
anybody else's house, as I spread my napkin on my knees.
And yet it is strangely difficult to see any other cause than
Mr. Gladstone's Acts for such ill-feeling.
68 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
As my sworn evidence, on which I was cross-examined in
the Parnell Commission, showed, I had only ten evictions in six
years among two thousand tenants.
I should like to ask, in what class of life is there not more
than one in twelve hundred that gets into financial troubles in
a year ?
In the insurance world such a ratio of claims to premiums
would make a perfect fortune to the companies.
The tenants were not associated with the Fenian move-
ment at all, the outbreak being solely confined to the towns-
folk, which, in Ireland, helped to make it a feeble affair. I
did not know one bona fide farmer that was connected with the
movement, and though the arms were mainly smuggled in from
America, mighty little hard cash came to the pockets of any
but the leaders.
Stephens was the original ' Number One,' and he was let
out of Kilmainham by the chief warder's wife. No one knew
where he was to be found, but the police, who were well aware
that he was devoted to his own wife, kept a strict watch on
her, and eventually caught him through his opening communi-
cations with her.
When the hue and cry was loudest, it was reported he had
come to Cork to foster the Fenian movement, and that he was
disguised in feminine garb.
One day my wife found her steps dogged by a man in the
most aggravating way, for he followed her into three shops
without attempting to speak to her, his only desire being to
shadow her, which he was doing in the most clumsy manner.
I was away at Dingle for the day, so my wife went into
the establishment of the leading linen-draper, and sending for
the head of the firm, asked him to speak to the man, who was
then pretending to buy some tape.
FENIANISM 69
It turned out that he was a detective fresh from Dublin, who
had taken it into his head that she was Stephens, and was most
apologetic, as well as crestfallen, at his error.
Some time after this Fenian fizzle, my coachman saw a
number of people being chased by the police for drilling ; and
about two years later, when I sent him to the Cork barracks
on private business, he told me that he there noticed some of
the very people who had been routed by the constabulary,
but this time they were being drilled by the Government
as militia.
I have always had a theory that Ireland was created by
Providence for the express purpose of bothering philosophers,
and preventing them or politicians from thinking themselves
too wise.
At the time when the Fenian scare was damaging Killarney
as a tourist resort. Sir Michael Morris — as he then was — was
staying at Morley's Hotel in London, and saw in the Ameri-
can paper lying on the table a vivid account of how the Fenian
army had attacked a British garrison, and would have easily
captured the stronghold had not an overpowering force of
English cavalry and artillery hurried up to deliver the besieged.
Of course, the facts were, that in County Limerick
several hundred ' patriots,' led by a man in a green calico
uniform, attacked a police barrack in which were five constables.
Keeping as much out of range of the constabulary fire as
possible, they had exchanged a few shots when a District
Inspector of Police, who resided some eight miles off, arrived
with ten constables on a couple of cars, at the sight of which
stupendous relieving force, the whole corps of young Irishmen
bolted.
Morris gave the waiter a shilling for the paper — and took
it off his tip at leaving, no doubt — and carefully treasured
70 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
the journal until he went to hold the next assizes at Limerick,
when he found the bulk of the attacking army in the dock
before him.
When the D. I. was giving evidence, Morris asked him : —
' Where were the British cavalry ? '
' What cavalry, my lord ? Why, there was none,*
' Oh ho,' says the judge. ' And where was the artillery.'' '
' Faith, my lord, there was as much artillery as there was
cavalry, and that would not get in the way of a donkey race.'
Then Morris, with appropriate solemnity, proceeded to
read out the newspaper account for the benefit of the audience.
The whole Court was convulsed with laughter, in which the
prisoners in the dock heartily joined.
After the trial was over, a parish priest came to congratu-
late Morris, and said to him : —
* My lord, you have laughed Fenianism out of Limerick.'
•^li^S^Wi
CHAPTER VIII
MYSELF, SOME FACTS, AND MANY STORIES
In 1850 I became agent to the Colthurst property, which
consisted of most of the parish of Bally vourney, one estate alone
containing about twenty-three thousand acres. The rental
was then over ^4600. There were only three slated houses
on the property, hardly any out-buildings, only seven miles of
road under contract, and about twenty acres planted.
By 1880 the landlord had expended _^ 30,000 on improve-
ments, there were over one hundred slated houses, about sixty
miles of roads, and over four hundred acres planted.
Under the Land Act of 1881 the rent was reduced to
^3600.
That was the encouragement officially given to the land-
lord for assisting in the improvement of his property.
From the time of Moses downwards, the policy of all
Governments has been to give relief to the debtor. By the
Encumbered Estate Act, which was passed just after the
famine, special relief was given to the creditor.
What the English view was may be taken from the Times : —
' In a few years more, a Celtic Irishman will be as rare in
Connemara as is the Red Indian on the shores of Manhattan.'
That is to say, English capital was at last to flow into
Ireland for the purchase of encumbered estates, but the
anticipation of course was erroneous.
English capital was placed for preference in Turkish and
71
72 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
in Egyptian bonds, to the great loss of all concerned. As for
Ireland, out of the first twenty millions realised by the new
Court, over seventeen was Irish money ; and at the outset
there was an inevitable downward tendency of prices which
involved heavy depreciation.
Credit was destroyed in Ireland, and every man who owed
a shilling was utterly ruined. Had the Government given
loans at a reasonable rate of interest, which would have amply
repaid them, all this could have been saved. As it was, pro-
perties were sold like chairs and tables at a paltry auction, and
in thousands of cases the judge expressed himself satisfied that
the rent could have been considerably increased.
I knew one unfortunate shopkeeper who paid ^6000
for a property under these circumstances ; and in place of an
increase of rent, the confiscators — that is to say the com-
missioners imposed by Mr. Gladstone — took a third of the
rental off him.
Those purchasers who were English conceived when they
bought properties that they would get as much from them as
the solvent tenants were willing to pay. The legislation of
Mr. Gladstone in coalition with the blunderbuss soon put an
end to the pleasing delusion. It was one more of the English
mistakes about Ireland, where, when the tenant is content to
pay, the British Government and the Land League both com-
bine to prevent him from offering a reasonable rent to a
landlord.
As a matter of fact, even the most seditionary organs
confessed that the tenants gained little and lost much by the
change from the old type of landlord to the new, for the latter,
being practical men, had no sympathy for the man who was
permanently behindhand with his rent. And no one can say
that this habitual arrear was a healthy stimulus to the moral
MYSELF, SOME FACTS, AND MANY STORIES 73
wellbeing of the tenant himself, though he felt aggrieved at
its being checked.
There is not the least need to sketch how I gradually
became one of the largest land agents in Ireland. It has been
published in other books, and would only prove wearisome if
set out in detail in this volume. So I will merely observe that
only two years after the big Fenian rising, as it was called —
which I should describe as being composed of a rabble of less
importance than the ragamuffins led by Wat Tyler — so little
was I impressed by its magnitude that I went to live at Eden-
burn. There I laid out a lot of money in rebuilding the
house, spending over ^^2000 in additions. This was most
idiotic of me, because I had not counted on the infernal
devices of Mr. Gladstone to render Ireland uninhabitable for
peaceful and law-abiding folk.
When I first settled down there, labourers were working
at eightpence or tenpence a day. Now the lowest rate is two
shillings. The labourer rectified this rate by emigration, and
if the farmers, who could more advantageously have emigrated,
had done so, the cry for compulsory reduction would never
have arisen.
Thus far I have dealt with facts and myself as concerned in
them, but I propose now to relate a few stories, a thing more
congenial to my temperament than any other form of conver-
sational exercise. Whether it will equally commend itself to
the reader is a matter on which I, as an aged novice in litera-
ture, though hopeful, am of course uncertain.
Indeed I am in exactly the predicament of a farmer's wife
who was asked by the Dowager Lady Godfrey, after a month
of marriage, how she liked her husband.
' I had plenty of recommendation with him,' was the reply,
* but I have not had enough trial of him yet to say for sure.'
74 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
There is a story about a honeymoon couple at Killarney
which is worth telling.
The bridegroom had a valet, a good, faithful fellow, long
in his service, but talkative, a thing his master loathed. He
said to him : —
' John, I 've often told you to hold your tongue about my
affairs. This time I emphatically mean it. If you tell the
people in the hotel that I am on my honeymoon, I '11 sack you
on the spot.'
So John promised to be as silent as the grave, but on the
third afternoon, as the happy pair were ascending the stairs
of the Victoria Hotel, they saw by the giggles and smirks of
the chambermaids that their secret had been discovered.
The bridegroom rang his bell and went for John in a
towering passion, but the fellow held his ground.
' Is it not unfair the way you are taking on ? Sure the
other servants did ask me if you were on your honeymoon,
but I was even with them, for I told them " devil a bit,
your honour was not going to marry the lady until next
month." '
I do not know how that alliance turned out, but the happy
pair left the hotel early next morning.
I can tell rather more about the matrimonial experiences
of an Archdeacon at Cork, who married firstly a woman who
was very fond of society. She died, and he then married
another, who grew very stout. She also died, and the inde-
fatigable cleric married as his third experiment a widow cursed
with a very violent temper.
He was one day chaffed on the practical demonstration he
had given to the Romish doctrine of the celibacy of the
Church, when he said : —
' After all they were a trial, for I married the world, the
MYSELF, SOME FACTS, AND MANY STORIES 75
flesh, and lastly the devil, and now I tremble whenever I think
of recognition in eternity.'
This Cork story comes naturally, because at that time 1
was living near Cork and very happily too.
Now and again we took trips up to Dublin when I had
business there.
I am not much of a playgoer, but in Dublin we always
went to the theatre on the chance of hearing some of the
proverbial wit of its gallery.
On one occasion, a lady in the play, when her lover had
had some doubt of her fidelity, exclaimed : —
' Would there were a mirror in my side that you could see
into my heart.'
Whereupon a voice from the gods shouted : —
* Would not a pain [i.e. pane] in your stomach do as well.
I have one myself.'
Lord Chancellor Brady was of a notoriously convivial
temperament, which did not prevent him being an admirable
lawyer when he would allow his wits to get their heads above-
water, so to speak, though it was little enough that he used to
dilute his spirits.
When Jenny Lind sang in some Italian opera, he occupied
a seat in the vice-regal box, and gazed at her through a porten-
tously enormous lorgnette.
This was too much for a wag in the gallery, who yelled : —
* Brady, me jewel, I 'm glad to see you 're fond of a big
glass yet.'
At the time of the Crimean War, John Reynolds, a very
energetic citizen, was perpetually raising the question about
the dangerous practice of driving outside cars from the side
instead of the box — in which he was undoubtedly right.
When he went to the theatre, a gallery boy shouted : —
76 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
' Three cheers for Alderman John Reynolds the hero
of Kars.'
The Lord Mayor of the period who sat beside him was a
tallow chandler, and the same spokesman shouted out : —
' Three cheers for his grease the Lord Mayor just back
from the races at Tallagh.'
That sort of thing seems to be particularly indigenous,
the only parallel being when undergraduates or medical
students get gathered together.
The eloquence of Irish members in the House of
Commons has really nothing to do with my reminiscences,
but I remember one occasion when it was uncommonly well
excelled by a stolid Englishman.
Fergus O'Connor — an Irishman, as his name betrays — was
an ardent Chartist, and before the Reform Bill was introduced
he said in the House that he had been accused of being a
personal enemy of King William's. This was quite untrue,
for if there were only good laws he did not care if the devil
were King of England.
Sir Robert Peel replied : —
' When the honourable member is gratified by seeing the
sovereign of his choice on the throne of these realms, I hope
he will enjoy, and I am sure he will deserve, the confidence of
the Crown.'
Whilst I am anecdotal, perhaps I had better say something
about books into which my stories have been pressed. I was
always given to telling tales, but of course my great time was
when Lord Morris and I would sit trying to cap one another.
If he were ever too idle to remember an anecdote of his own,
he would reel off one of mine : as for his own fund of stories
and humour ever approaching exhaustion, that was not to be
thought of. He was far and away the wittiest man I ever
MYSELF, SOME FACTS, AND MANY STORIES 77
met, and if I do not quote one of his tales on this page it is
because no single sample can show the superb richness of his
vintage, and more than one of his brand will be found scattered
in the present volume.
I gave a good many anecdotes to my dear old friend
Mr. W. R. Le Fanu — cheeriest of fishermen, kindest of jolly
good fellows — for his garrulous book. He observes in his
preface that he makes his first attempt at writing in his
eight-and-seventieth year. I am nearly twenty-four months
his senior when thus far on the road of these reminiscences.
I also echo another phrase of his : —
* I trust I have said nothing to hurt the feelings of any of
my fellow-countrymen.'
Just one quotation — and only a little one — which is not
mine, but the warning which Sheridan Le Fanu, author of
that capital novel Uncle Silas^ gave in the Dublin University
Magazine against matrimony : —
' Marriage is like the smallpox. A man may have it
mildly, but he generally carries the marks of it with him to
his grave.'
And very true too in his division of an Irishman's life into
three parts : —
* The first is that in which he is plannin' and conthrivin'
all sorts of villainy and rascality ; that is the period of youth
and innocence. The second is that in which he is puttin' into
practice the villainy and rascality he contrived before ; that is
the prime of life or the flower of manhood. The third and
last period is that in which he is makin' his soul and preparin'
for another world ; that is the period of dotage.'
Shakespeare's seven ages of man may have been more
poetical, but it does not betray a closer grip of the Irish
temperament.
78 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
My other appearance as a literary ghost or rather as an
anonymous contributor was when I supplied Mrs. O'Connell
with stories for The Last Count of the Irish Brigade. That was
about twenty years ago, and therefore long after the death of
the hero who was uncle to the Liberator,
The writer was a daughter of Charles Bianconi, the
originator of all the mail-cars in Ireland, who owned at one
time sixteen hundred horses, and always laughed at the idea
of any violence on the part of the peasantry, pointing out that
though his cars daily covered four thousand miles in twenty-
tv/o counties, no injury was ever done to any of his property.
Mrs. O'Connell was married to a nephew of the great
Dan, and he represented Kerry in Parliament for nearly thirty
years. He was an intimate friend of Thackeray's, and gave
him all the idioms of his delightful Irish ballads. This
O'Connell was a clever, amusing fellow, and precious idle
into the bargain.
I remember one story he told me.
Mrs. MacCarthy, near Millstreet, had a son, a small
proprietor, and he got married. The mother-in-law lived
with the daughter-in-law, who had rather grand ideas, and
set up as parlour-maid in the house a raw lass just taken
from the dairy.
One afternoon old Mrs. MacCarthy saw the parish
priest coming to call, and told the girl if he asked for
Mrs. MacCarthy to say she vvas not in but the dowager
was.
Now the maid had never heard the word dowager in her
life, but thought she would make a shot for it, so when his
reverence asked if Mrs. MacCarthy was at home, she blurted
out : —
' No, sir, but the badger is.'
MYSELF, SOME FACTS, AND MANY STORIES 79
And to her dying day the relic of deceased MacCarthy
went by the name of ' the badger.'
Now it is really time I related how my own beauty was
spoilt, by breaking my nose in 1858.
I was racing the present Knight of Kerry and a young
gunner named Hickson — no relation — on the Strand, when
the horse of the latter collided with my own, and they both
fell at the same time. He was a loose rider, and being shot
off some distance from his animal picked himself up unhurt.
I had always a tight grip, so I got entangled in the saddle
which twisted round, and my mare almost literally tore off my
face with her hind hoof.
I walked back a quarter of a mile, trying to hold my face
on to my head with my hand ; and in a month's time I was
able to get about again, which the doctor said was one of the
quickest cases of healing he had ever known.
But I was absolutely unrecognised by my acquaintances
when I reappeared, and Mr. Dillon the R.M. actually took
me for a walk in Tralee to see the town, thinking I was a
stranger, a situation the fun of which I heartily appreciated.
Before that infernal gallop I had a hooked nose like the
Duke of Wellington ; and it 's lucky I got married when I
did, for no one would have had me afterwards, though my
own wife always says * for shame ' if I make the remark in her
presence, God bless her.
When I went to the Abbey of St. Denis, near Paris, I
told the verger I was very anxious to see the likeness of the
saint who had walked for six miles with his head in his hand,
because I was the nearest living counterpart, having walked a
quarter of a mile with my face in mine.
Hickson was universally congratulated on his lucky escape.
He went out to India and was dead in eighteen months.
8o REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
and here am I at eighty with half my face and some of my
health still in spite of the attentive care of my family and
the doctor.
My present doctor is a capital fellow, and when he comes to
see me he laughs so much at my stories that I always think he
ought to take me half price. Instead of that he regards me as
an animated laboratory for his interesting chemical experi-
ments ; but I had the best of him last time I was laid up, for I
made him take a dose of the filthy compound he had ordered
for me the previous day.
First he said he wouldn't, then he said he couldn't, but I
said what was not poison for the patient could not hurt the
physician ; and in the end he had to swallow the dose, making
far more fuss over its nasty taste than I did. But I noted
that he at once wrote me a new prescription, which was as
sweet as any advertised syrup, and further, that he arranged
his next visit should be just after I finished the bottle.
However, that is years and years after the time of which I
am treating.
Yet I am tempted to anticipate, because the mention of
Edenburn earlier in this chapter suggests a quaint individual
about whom a few observations may be made.
Bill Hogan was our factotum. He was stable-boy, steward,
ladies'-maid, and professional busybody, as well as a bit of a
character, though he possessed none worth mentioning.
When we were packing up to leave Edenburn, my wife
was watching him fill two casks, one with home-made jam, the
other with china.
Called away to luncheon, she found on her return both
casks securely nailed down.
*Oh, you should not have done that. Bill,' she said, 'for
now we shan't know which contains which.'
MYSELF, SOME FACTS, AND MANY STORIES 8i
' I thought of that, ma'am,' replies Bill, ' so I have written
S for chiney on the one, and G for jam on the other.'
Bill's orthography was obviously original.
So was the drive he took with a certain cheery guest of
mine one Sabbath morning.
The said guest desired more refreshment than he was
likely to get at that early hour at Edenburn, so he drove into
Tralee, ostensibly to church, and told Bill to have the car
round at the club at one.
' Well,' narrated Bill afterwards, ' out came the Captain
from the club, having a few drinks taken, and up he got on
the car with my help, but at the corner of Denny Street he
pulled up at the whisky store, and said we must drink the
luck of the road. Well we drank the luck at every house on
the way out of the town, and presently in the road down
came the mare, pitching the Captain over the hedge, and
marking her own knees, as well as breaking the shaft. At last
we all got home somehow, and there in the yard was the
master, looking us all three up and down as though he were
going to commit us all from the Bench. Then a twinkle
came into his eye, and he said as mild as a dove to the
Captain, " I see by the look of her knees you 've been taking
the mare to say her prayers." '
CHAPTER IX
THE HARENC ESTATE
So large a part has the purchase of this estate made in my
more public appearances, owing to the fact that I have been
brought into general notice through offensive legal pro-
ceedings, that a brief account of the matter must form part
of my reminiscences.
Prior to 1878, a gentleman named Harenc, the owner of a
large extent of landed property in the north of Kerry, died.
Who the estate subsequently belonged to I am uncertain.
Anyhow, according to the title-deeds, it was somehow divided
among ten or twelve individuals before the property came into
the Land Estate Courts for sale.
This circumstance suggested to a large number of the
tenantry that it might be an opportunity to avail themselves
of the provisions of the Bright Clauses, and become pretty
cheaply the owners of the land on which they lived.
After they had offered the sum of ^75,000 for the
estate, for the purpose of splitting it up into small holdings,
it was found that the trustee had privately agreed to sell
it to Mr. Goodman Gentleman, the agent for the late Mr.
Harenc, for ^65,000.
The tenants were not going to be frustrated by that —
being Irishmen and litigious, which is one and the same
thing. So they appealed to the Landed Estates Court, and
induced Judge Ormsby to make an order annulling the deed
82
THE HARENC ESTATE 83
of sale, and directing that the property should be put up in
lots suitable to the purposes of the tenants.
Several of the tenants who did not want the property split
up approached me to suggest I should buy the property, and
appeared by counsel — the present Judge Johnson — in support
of me.
I met the tenants, and stated that if it fell to me I would
give each of them a lease of thirty-one years, and indemnify
myself for the purchase-money by a rise on the entire rental
of five per cent, on the valuation of each estate, according to
current estimates, at which they showed every sign of satis-
faction.
I then offered ;^ 8 0,000 for the whole estate, and was
declared the purchaser. A large bonfire was lighted on
February 20th, 1878, by the tenants at Aghabey, near
Luxnow, on their being apprised I had become their land-
lord.
Another section of tenants, however, were anxious that
the property should be bought by Messrs. Lombard and
Murphy, private individuals I never met.
The judge of the Landed Estate Court, Judge Ormsby,
gave them the property.
I appealed against this decision, and the Court of Appeal
unanimously reversed the verdict of Judge Ormsby, the three
judges being the Lord Chancellor of Ireland, the Master of
the Rolls — who said it was one of the most important cases
decided since the foundation of the Land Court — and Lord
Justice Deasy. I have been told on most excellent authority
that Lord Justice Christian declined to sit because, as he told
the Lord Chancellor, he felt so strongly in my favour that he
could not hear the case with an unbiassed mind.
There had been a demonstration at the previous decision,
84 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
but it paled before the great rejoicings over my success among
all the tenantry over whom I was agent. There were more
than fifty bonfires blazing that night in Kerry, so that the
county looked as though it were signalling the advent of
another Armada, as in the fragment Macaulay left. The only
place where any opposition was exhibited was in Castleisland,
whence the Lombard family originally sprang ; and there the
lighted tar-barrels, which had been placed on the ruins of the
old castle, were extinguished, to avoid unpleasant contact with
a gang of rowdy roughs.
Messrs. Lombard and Murphy had stated that they were
buying on behalf of the tenants. So I served them with notice
that if they undertook to sell to every tenant his own holding
they might have the property.
This they very wisely declined, and left me in the position
that in 1879 I finally purchased a property on what was called
an indefeasible Parliamentary title, under the approval of Her
Majesty's Judges, and in 188 1 an Act of Parliament practically
took one-third of it from me.
In 188 1 I wrote a letter to Mr. Gladstone, asking him to
take my property and give me back my money.
To this he returned an evasive answer, declining my offer.
If the tenants had themselves bought the Harenc property
at that time they would by this time all be paupers, for they
could only get two-thirds of the money from Government,
and would have had to borrow the other third at a heavy rate
of interest.
One man, Mr. Hewson, bought one of the farms for
^13,500, and under Mr. Gerald Balfour's Act of 1896 it was
compulsorily sold to the tenants for about ^^6000. I have the
exact figures at Tralee, but these are approximate enough for
the purpose of demonstration.
THE HARENC ESTATE 85
Several of the other tenants took me into Court.
I had a piece of reclaimable ground on my own hands
which I let for eight shillings an acre. The adjoining tenant,
with exactly the same nature of land — which he swore on oath
he had paid more than the fee-simple in improving — had his
rent fixed by the County Court at four shillings an acre.
To be sure, if the County Court valuer had not done so,
he would have quickly lost his employment. The position is
one incompatible with honesty, and the value of land, apart
from what you can get for it, is a very disputable matter.
My relations with my Harenc tenantry were always
good.
After the purchase in 1879 J had no trouble with them,
and on the contrary received the warmest thanks from the
parish priest for my conduct as a landlord.
I drained soil and imported seed potatoes, besides executing
other improvements. The estate was not in good order when
I purchased it, and I know from other sources that the tenants
were well satisfied with me.
1 may as well mention, that having no agencies on the
Listowel side of Kerry, I was never on the Harenc property
before the question of purchasing arose, and it had on it no
house in which I and my family could reside.
Until 1 881 no tenant made any hostile move, but one
fellow, who took me into the Land Court after the Land Act,
presented a very curious case.
This man, whose rent was sixty-five pounds a year, applied
to the Court for reduction. There was a press of business
at the time which necessitated an adjournment, but in the
end the Court fixed the new rent at the same amount as the
old rent.
The tenant appealed ; but though the Appeal Court valuers
86 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
attested that it was worth seventy-five pounds a year, still the
rent was unchanged.
In other words, the Government sold me a farm and
parliamentary title at sixty-five pounds a year which one set
of Commissioners thought fair and the other thought cheap,
and yet I had to spend more than half a year's rent in defend-
ing my title to it.
There is no appeal as to value, except to the head
Commissioners. They appoint two other Sub-Commissioners
to inspect the land, and they of course avoid disagreeing with
their brethren.
It is very like Mr. Spenlow in David Copperfield, who
said, ' If you are not satisfied with Doctors' Commons you can
go to the delegates,' and being asked who the delegates were,
he replied that they came from Doctors' Commons.
I bought the Harenc property as a speculation, and it
turned out a confoundedly bad one.
Once I had a conversation with a Land Leaguer on the
subject. He said : —
' You bought a stolen horse, and must take the conse-
quences.'
' If that were so,' I retorted, ' I would have an action
against the Government which sold me the horse.'
I had a correspondence on the subject with Mr. Chamber-
lain, which elicited some remarkable letters ; but as he marked
all of his private and confidential, they of course cannot be
published.
Now for a few anecdotes, just to show that I have not
exhausted my stock.
It would be cruel to specify the individual of whom I can
truthfully say, he was the biggest fool that ever disfigured the
Irish bench.
THE HARENC ESTATE 87
He had been tutor to the children of a great peer, and his
patron subsequently pressed the Prime Minister to do some-
thing for him.
* I can't make him a County Court judge,' said the Prime
Minister, 'for he would never decide rightly.'
' Well,' said another Minister, * we are going out, and have
not the ghost of a chance of ever getting in again in our time.
Let him be Solicitor-General for Ireland during the last weeks
we hold office.'
So this was done out of sheer good-nature ; but after the
election the Government found themselves saddled with him,
for in those days holders of high office were not shelved at
the caprice of Premiers, whilst the country had unexpectedly
returned the old gang to power.
It has always been averred by the Irish Bar that an office
was specially created for the purpose of shunting this legal
luminary into it, but as an historical fact I will not vouch for
the truth of the sarcasm. The account of the Cabinet con-
clave came to me on excellent authority.
When Chief Justice Monaghan died. Lord Morris, who
was then a Puisne Judge of Common Pleas, observed that
he himself had a good chance of the post.
* What about Keagh and Lawson ? ' asked his acquaint-
ance, they being brother judges.
* Very good men,' replied Lord Morris, * but as they were not
appointed by the Tories, I don't think they '11 promote them.'
* And how about Ormsby ? ' continued the other.
* Ah now,' said Morris, ' you are getting sarcastic'
There is a cheery story about Judge Keagh, who has just
been mentioned.
A number of brothers were before him, charged with
killing a man at Listowel.
88 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
The judge was most anxious to ascertain from an import-
ant witness what share each of the accused had in the murder.
' What did John do ? '
* He struck him with his stick on the head.'
' And James ? '
' James hit him with his fist on the jaw.'
' And Philip ? '
' Philip tried to get him down and kick him.'
' And Timothy ? '
* He could do nothing, my lord, but he was just walking
round searching for a vacancy.'
Which reminds me that fair play is not always recognised
as essential in these matters, as the following anecdote shows.
There was a faction feud between the Kellehers and Leehys
near Sneem.
One of the Leehys had a bad leg, and was therefore bound
apprentice to a shoemaker in Sneem.
On a fair day a solitary Kelleher ventured into the town,
and very speedily the Leehys had half-killed and beaten him
as well as their numbers would allow.
Suddenly there was a shout, and the poor lame Leehy came
hobbling down the street as fast as his wooden leg would
permit.
* Boys, for the love of mercy,' says he, ' let a poor cripple
have one go at the black-hearted varmint.'
One of the counsel engaged in the Harenc case was Mr.
Murphy, who was a near relative of Judge Keagh, and he was
a man of ready wit into the bargain.
There was a company promoter from London, who had
induced several people to take shares in a bogus concern, and
was consequently defendant in an action brought against him
in Cork.
THE HARENC ESTATE 89
He thought he would make an impression on the wild
Irish by being overdressed and gorgeously bejewelled.
When Murphy arose to address the jury, he said : —
'Gentlemen of the jury, look at the well-tailored impostor
without a rag of honesty to take the gloss off his new clothes.*
Another counsel in the case was Mr. Byrne. He was
always in impecunious circumstances despite his legal eloquence,
but the lack of a balance at his banker's never troubled him.
Once he took Chief Justice Whiteside to see his new house
in Dublin, which he had furnished in sumptuous style.
' Don't you think I deserve great credit for this ? ' he
asked at length.
' Yes,' retorted Whiteside, ' and you appear to have got
it.'
Lord Justice Christian, who had declined to sit on the
Appeal, was considered one of the soundest opinions in Ireland.
When he ceased to be sole Judge of Appeal, he had addressed
the Bar after this fashion : —
' As this is the last time I sit as sole Judge of Appeal, it
is an opportune time for me to review my decisions. By a
curious coincidence, I have been thirteen years in this Court,
and I have decided thirteen cases which have been taken to
the House of Lords. Eleven of my decisions were confirmed,
one appeal was withdrawn, and the last was a purely equity
case. The two equity lords went with me, the two common
law lords were against me, and when I inform the Bar that my
judgment was reversed on the casting vote of Lord O'Hagan,
I do not think they will attach much importance to the
decision.'
Judge Christian's allusion to the Land Act is most note-
worthy, for he said : —
* The property of the country is confided to the discretion
90 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
of certain roving commissioners without any fixed rules to
guide and direct them. In fact, we have reverted to the
primitive state of society, where men make and administer the
laws in the same breath.'
Reverting to the Harenc estate, a rather amusing account
was once perpetrated by a Special Commissioner.
' Never heard tell of Ballybunion ? ' said his carman to the
journalist as on the road they met the carts laden with sand
and seaweed from that place. ' Why it 's a great place intirely
in the season, when quality from all parts come for the sea-
bathing.'
As he evidently regarded it as the first watering-place
in the world, the Special Commissioner thought he had better
see the place, and here is his description : —
' A village perched on the summit of a cliff, an ancient
castle of the Fitz- Maurice clan, wonderful caves, and a little
hotel are the leading features of the place.
* The morning after my arrival, I experienced a wish to see
the cliffs and caves, and no sooner were the words spoken than
a figure bearing an unlit torch appeared at the door.
* It was Beal-bo (which may be translated into a somewhat
Sioux cognomen — the Yellow Cow). A figure in rags with
an inimitable limp, and a fashion of closing one eye that
reminds one of Victor Hugo's Quasimodo of Notre Dame.
A more intimate acquaintance proved there was much instruc-
tion, and a good deal of amusement, to be derived from this
strange character.
' The grand cave is Beal-bo's special source of revenue.
He regards it as his own property, and takes a pride in it
accordingly. This is the theatre of the many wiles he prac-
tises upon unsuspecting strangers. When he has lured them
into the bowels of the cave, he turns down a gallery, and
THE HARENC ESTATE 91
informs them that they cannot get out unless they cross a
pool about five feet wide. When he has his victim upon his
back, he seizes the opportunity to levy blackmail, for the
pool is a quicksand and he suddenly affects great fear. After
he has sunk to the knees in the yielding sand, the tourist is
glad enough to give him a shilling to hurry across.
' In another gallery it is necessary for the stranger to
cross a pool on a plank which Beal-bo provides for the occasion,
and on this he charges a toll. He used to let the water in to
deepen the pools before the tourists came through, in order to
bring his plank into requisition.
' Suspended on a cliff between heaven and sea, one hundred
feet above the water, on all sides were piled the immense
masses of masonry, the ruins of which are all that remains of
the once proud Castle of Doon. Gazing in awe down the
horrid depths of the " Puffing Hole," Beal-bo informed us : —
* " Twas there Brian used to sleep in the day, and come out
at night to milk the cows up in the Killarney hills, he and his
dog."'
The Special Commissioner looked incredulous, but Beal-bo
was confident : —
* " May I never be saved, sir, if I haven't seen him meself,
many a night, sir, as he climbed the cliffs backwards to rob
the hawks' nests." '
How can even a Special Commissioner dispute an eye-
witness ?
Still the knowledge that I own a harbour of refuge for
Brian will hardly repay me for all the expense and anxiety
the Harenc property has caused me.
Before quitting the subject, I can conclude with a more
gratifying fact.
At the time of the Tralee election, when I stood as a
92 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Conservative, a small clique of mob orators and amateur
politicians tried to make political capital out of the history
of the Harenc estate, and a priest, Father M. O'Connor, rode
the jaded topic to death. The unkindest cut of all to him was
the direct contradiction by the tenants themselves of every
assertion that their self-constituted champions made on their
behalf.
' We, the tenants of the Harenc estate, think it our duty
to state that since Mr. S. M. Hussey became purchaser of
the above estate, he has in every respect treated us kindly.
He was good enough to give us seed potatoes for half the
price they cost himself; he also drained our portions of the
land at two and a half per cent., employed all the labourers,
and paid them good wages while so employed by him. As a
landlord we find him liberal and generous.'
To this were appended fifty signatures, and the best part
of all is that the whole of the manifesto was absolutely un-
solicited by me, proving an unexpected source of pleasure.
CHAPTER X
KERRY ELECTIONS
An election in most places is an occasion for breaking heads,
abusing opponents, and other similar demonstrations of ardent
local philanthropy. Such opportunities are never lost by Kerry
men, whose heads are harder and whose wits are sharper than
those of the average run of humanity. If you are a real
Kerry man of respectable convictions, and self-respecting into
the bargain, you will never let the man who is drinking with
you entertain any opinions but your own at election times.
If he contradicts you, it 's up with your stick and a crack on
his skull, and as that only tickles him up — having much the
effect of a nettle under a donkey's tail — you then go outside
and mutually destroy as much of each other as can be effected
in a fight. Some weeks later, when the vanquished is able to
crawl away from the dispensary doctor, and so save his own
life amid the dire forebodings of that physician, who refuses
to answer for the consequences, you begin to drink with him
again just to show there is no ill-feeling ; which of course
there is not, if you and he are both real Kerry men.
Naturally, if you get a sullen, revengeful, calculating Pro-
testant from the North, it 's another matter, for he '11 be far
too friendly with the constabulary and won't hold with the
good old local ways approved by every Kerry Papist and
tolerated by most of the priests.
In 1 85 1 there was a Kerry election. A Protestant candi-
93
94 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
date stood, and so did one who in those days was a Whig.
I went stoutly for the Protectionist, but the priests plumped
for the Free Trader, and their congregations have been
regretting it ever since.
One tenant was driving in a gig with me to the poll when
a priest passed me on the road and said to my tenant : —
* May the blast of the Almighty be upon you, for I know
you are being taken to vote the wrong way.'
The tenant got very nervous, for in those times it was
generally believed that the priests had power to change men
into frogs and toads, a superstition by no means obsolete even
now in lone districts. However, I took him along very easily,
giving him the benefit of the roll of my tongue as to what
he should do, and before he reached the polling-booth he
recovered and voted for the Tory.
A Mr. Scully from Tipperary was the Whig candidate, and
the family was not popular in its own county.
A Cork man, making inquiries of a Tipperary man about
him, was answered : —
* I don't know this gentleman personally, but I believe we
have already shot the best of the family.'
Mr. Scully was a very amusing man, and in the House
of Commons he used to go by the nickname of ' old
Skull.'
Lord Monk accosted him by this name one night, and
Mr. Scully replied : —
' If you have taken the '* e y " off your own name, my lord,
it is no reason you should do it off mine.'
Here is another story of him.
Mr. Dillwyn said to him, a Roman Catholic : —
' I have lived sixty years in this world, and I don't yet
know the difference between the two religions.'
KERRY ELECTIONS 95
* Bydad,' retorted Scully, ' you will not have been five
minutes in the other without finding it out.'
Shortly after the franchise was enlarged — which threw
Imperial Parliament at the mercy of the ignorant — old Lord
Kenmare died and the present peer was called up to the
House of Lords.
Lord Kenmare was the most popular landlord in Kerry,
and he selected a Roman Catholic cousin of his, Mr. Dease,
to stand for the county, Mr. Roland Blennerhasset, a young
Protestant landlord, being started against him in support of
Home Rule principles.
The Roman Catholic bishop and most of the priests backed
Mr. Dease, but the Home Rule candidate beat him by three
to one. Some of the priests, who were very obnoxious to the
people, supported Mr. Blennerhasset, and were then idoHsed,
whilst a very popular parish priest, who canvassed for Mr.
Dease, had to run for his life.
From thenceforth no one but a Home Rule candidate had
any chance in Munster, and Mr. Roland Blennerhasset, having
seen the error of his ways, afterwards became a Unionist
candidate in England. He is a very clever man, who was
quite young then, but has now blossomed into a K.C. in
London, and is mighty shrewd about speculations.
The election was great fun except for the stones and
bricks, of which enough were thrown about to build a city
without foundations. Mr. Dease got a blow on his ribs at
Castle Island, which told on his health, and he died soon
afterwards. He was a brother of Sir Gerald Dease, and a
man very much liked.
It was during this election that I was fired at one night
at Aghadoe, returning from Puck Fair at Killorghin.
A rumour was started that it was the work of one of the
96 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
tenants on Sir George Colthurst's Cork estates, and the Tralee
correspondent of the Examiner telegraphed his belief in this,
adding * so repugnant are Kerry men to these dastardly
outrages.'
They took to them as greedily as a duck to water in later
times, as all the world knows ; and in the light of subsequent
events it is delightful to remember that the Freeman stated,
* All condemn this dastardly act, for Mr. Hussey is universally
respected.'
It atoned for this lapse into truth by subsequently taking
my name in vain hundreds of times in the bad periods that
were ahead.
There had been a libel case between the Rev. Denis
O'Donoghue, parish priest of Ardfert, and myself. The
address of this cleric in proposing Mr. Blennerhasset at the
nomination had annoyed those he assailed intensely. Up
to that point I had been utterly indifferent, but after that I
strained every nerve to defeat Father O'Donoghue's nominee.
This is an extract from his speech at Ardfert : —
* Sam Hussey is a vulture with a broken beak, and he laid
his voracious talons on the consciences of the voters. (Boos.)
The ugly scowl of Sam Hussey came down upon them. He
wanted to try the influence of his dark nature on the poor
people. (Groans). Where was the legitimate influence of such
a man ? Was it in the white terror he diffused ^ Was it not
the espionage, the network of spies with which he surrounded
his lands } He denied that a man who managed property had
for that reason a shadow of a shade of influence to justify him
in asking a tenant for his vote. What had they to thank
him for '^. '
A voice : ' Rack rents.'
* They knew the man from his boyhood, from his gossoon-
KERRY ELECTIONS 97
hood. He knew him when he began with a collop of sheep as
his property in the world. (Laughter.) Long before he got
God's mark on him. It was not the man's fault but his
misfortune that he got no education. (Laughter.) He had in
that parish schoolmasters who could teach him grammar for
the next ten years. The man was in fact a Uriah Heep
among Kerry landlords. (Cheers.)'
The result of this and other incentives to irritability was
that the voters for Mr. Dease had to be escorted by troops
and constabulary.
The sporting proclivities had already been shown over a
race. In tlje County Club at Tralee there was an altercation
between Mr. Sandes and a leading ' Deasite ' as to the rival
merits of a bay mare belonging to one and a chestnut horse
owned by the other.
Quoth Mr. Sandes : —
' I '11 run you a two mile steeplechase for a hundred
guineas if you like, and I '11 call my horse Home Rule — do
you call yours Deasite ; each to ride his own horse.'
No Kerry man could refuse such a challenge, and the race
excited more interest than the election.
Mr. Sandes won, leaving ' Deasite ' nowhere, and this
helped Mr. Blennerhasset to head the poll.
More than one man is asserted to have voted for : —
' Him you know that me landlord wants me to vote for.'
But I should say several dozen voted for : —
* Him you know that the priest, God bless him, tells me
to vote for.'
The libel over which the action arose was alleged to have
been published in the Cork Examiner^ and the words com-
plained of were pretty sturdy.
The jury returned a verdict of one farthing for the
98 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
plaintiff priest, and I do not think he derived as much
advertisement out of it as Miss Marie Corelli obtained from
a similar coin of the realm.
; ' Of course all this should have shown me that I had in my
own interests better keep clear of Kerry politics, but after I
had bought the Harenc estate, I stood for Tralee as a Tory
against The O'Donoghue, who was a Nationalist. I never
supposed I was going to get in, but I really had a capital
run for the Parliamentary Handicap, though I was weighted
by political convictions and penalised by my creed. The
priests made a most active set against me. There were only
fifty Protestants on the register, and yet I managed to get one
hundred and thirty votes, for which suffrages some eighty
honest men must have been well worrited in the confessional.
The O'Donoghue polled one hundred and eighty votes,
and I believe a good many of his supporters had strong views
on the currency question, and he was backed by a wealthy
merchant. The constituency is now merged into the county,
and the remotest chance of returning a rational member is
now at an end.
The O'Donoghue did not stand after the merging of the
constituency, though he was well used to electioneering work
and had fought me very pleasantly, with as much devil about
him as would make an angel palatable.
I did not much care for the whole thing. Still I was
always a bit of a stormy petrel rejoicing in a gale, and my
capacity has not waned even in my eightieth year.
The mob indulged in some lively work. A good many
windows of houses belonging to my supporters were broken
and a man stabbed.
The polling day was made the occasion of a public
holiday, which meant that the bulk of the population was
KERRY ELECTIONS 99
imbibing a great deal more than was compatible with the
laws of equilibrium. Some amusement was caused by the
panic of The O'Donoghue's supporters at the votes I was
getting, and presently they brought up in cars one poor man
in an advanced stage of consumption, and another unable to
walk from old age.
It was a wearisome day to me ; but before its close it
became abundantly evident that if the electors were allowed
to exercise a free discretion and vote according to their con-
sciences, I should have headed the poll by a large majority.
However in Ireland man proposes and the priest disposes.
At a meeting of the Conservative electors in Cork, Mr.
Standford read a telegram announcing the return of The
O'Donoghue in Tralee, which was received with hisses. He
said the reason I had stood there was a requisition, signed by
Sir Henry Donovan, in the presence of nine grand jurors of
the County of Kerry, calling on me to do so. Sir Henry
Donovan had since turned over to The O'Donoghue from
the man he had forced into the field. Now that would
teach them not to be fooled by Liberal promises. It almost
made him believe no truth, no honour, and no sincerity existed
among their opponents.
This was received with applause, which was renewed with
laughter when Mr. Young observed : —
* I will make one remark. I think Sir Henry Donovan
and The O'Donoghue are well met.'
To show that strong views in my favour were not confined
to Protestants, I may quote the following letter written from
the Augustinian Convent in Drogheda by J. A. Anderson,
O.S.A. :—
* If the electors of Tralee return Mr. O'Donoghue {alias
The O'Donoghue) as their representative in the coming
lOo REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Parliament, they will be false to Ireland, false to the men that
galvanised the dead body that Gavan Duffy left on " the dis-
secting table " before starting for Australia, and they will have
the honour (?) of returning to Parliament the greatest political
renegade to Irish nationality that this generation has known.'
A lady has recently drawn my attention to a footnote in
Mr. Lecky's History of Ireland^ where is quoted from a letter
of my ancestor, Colonel Maurice Hussey, the following
opinion : —
' It — i.e. Tralee — was a nest of thieves and smugglers, and
so it always will be until nine parts of ten of O'Donoghue's
old followers be proclaimed and hanged on gibbets on the
spot.'
So when O'Donoghues have troubled me, it is a case of
history repeating itself, and if the percentage of the followers
of the modern chieftain had been 'removed' — as the modern
phrase in Ireland ran — according to the manner advocated
by my ancestor, I could have voted in Parliament against
dismembering the Empire to gratify the eagerness of an old
man to truckle to the traitors of the country intrusted to
his care.
CHAPTER XI
DRINK
Of course one of the great troubles in Ireland is drink. I
am no advocate for teetotalism, for I think a man who can
enjoy a moderate glass is a better one than his brother who
has to drink water in order that he may not yield to the over-
powering ' tempitation ' — to quote Mr. Huntley Wright — to
get drunk ! But for my fellow-countrymen I can see that
drink is a terrible curse, one which is the cause of half the
crime, half the illness, and more than half the misery that
exists there.
Of all Irish benefactors, possibly Father Mathew was the
.greatest ; but in my boyish days, when it became known that
men, not yet in a lunatic asylum, had taken up the notion
that human life was possible without alcoholic drinks, the wits
of Kerry and Cork were heartily diverted at the bare idea.
It used to be the stock joke after dinner, even when Father
Mathew was in the zenith of his triumph.
In Cork if you laugh at a thing you can generally suppress
it, for, whereas all Irishmen are keenly susceptible to ridicule,
the Cork folk are even more so.
The cold water business furnished endless jests, but it
survived them.
Perhaps the strangest thing of all was the clergyman who
preached against it as being irreligious, taking as the text of
his sermon, ' Wine, that maketh glad the heart of man.'
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102 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
I like a man who is disinterested, therefore I wish to
remind the present generation that Father Mathew came of a
stock of distillers, and his family was among the first to suffer
by his preaching.
It was probable there would be a reaction after his death ;
and when that event took place, after the famine and fever,
none really took his place to warn the diminishing population,
in sufficiently effective fashion, of all the ills that drink was
laying up for them.
Wherever, in my work, I found Government relief works,
within a stone's throw of every pay office a whisky shop
started into operation.
New Ireland arose from the famine, and she has never
since shown much sign of temperance. Indeed, an excessive
amount of money is, and has ever since then been, spent on
liquor in Ireland.
At Castleisland, the scene of so many outrages, the popula-
tion of the town is thirteen hundred, and the number of whisky
shops is fifty-two. Very nearly the same proportion can be
noticed in several other towns.
There never was an outrage committed without an empty
whisky bottle being found close to the scene of the murder.
In the worst time a moonlighter slept for a fortnight close
to the house of an Irish landlord, who was well aware that he
was there for the express purpose of shooting him, but he
never even attempted it.
' Time after time I lay in a ditch to have a go at him, but
he would ride by, looking for all the world as if he would
shoot a flea off the tail of a shnipe, so that, with all the
whisky in the world to help me, I dared not do it,' was his
explanation before he left for America.
Did you never hear the parish priest's sermon ?
DRINK 103
' It 's whisky makes you bate your wives ; it 's whisky
makes your homes desolate ; it 's whisky makes you shoot
your landlords, and ' — with emphasis, as he thumped the pulpit
— ' it 's whisky makes you miss them.'
There is as much truth in that sermon as in any that was
preached last Sunday between Belfast and GlengarifF.
As a matter of fact, the profits to the drink retailer are not
so enormous as might be imagined, owing to the competition.
In the neighbourhood of Castleisland there is one group of
twelve houses and nine of these are whisky booths. However
anxious the population may be to consume immoderate amounts
of the fiery liquor, and however large the traffic on the road
— never a big thing in Ireland, except on market-day — the
division of the local receipts by nine is apt to diminish the
profits in each case.
It has been suggested to me by a lady who knows Kerry
well, that the consumption of drink might be diminished if a
law were passed forcing the publicans to sell food. As she
very truly remarks, it is often impossible for the country folk,
even on market-day, when coming into a town, to get food for
immediate consumption.
However, I do not think this would have any effect.
When away from his cabin the Irishman and the Irishwoman
want drink, not food, for there are a few potatoes at home
which will provide all the solid sustenance most of them
desire.
If her proposal were made law, each publican would keep a
loaf in his window, and there it would stay for a year.
That reminds me of the man who was waiting in Water-
ford Station on March 12th, and to pass the time had a ham
sandwich at the bar.
After one mouthful he asked the astonished barmaid for
I04 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
another, made of February bread, because he really felt that it
was time January bread might have a rest.
To give an example of how Irishmen crave for drink, I will
relate an incident connected with the Parnell Commission.
Three of Lord Kenmare's tenants had been sent over in
charge of an experienced and reliable man to give evidence,
and on their return journey, when they arrived at North
Wall— the hour being 6 a.m. — the conductor said: —
' There is cold meat, or bread and cheese. Now, what
will your fancy be ^ '
Far from wanting nutrition after an all night journey,
or even the soothing solace of a cup of tea, it was half a pint
of whisky apiece that they all asked for.
Just as much drinking exists among the Protestants as
among the Roman Catholics, only there is a trifle more
geniality in the bibulous propensities of the latter. Much less
affects an Irishman than a Scotsman. The latter, when he
has absorbed all the whisky he can assimilate in a bout — and
no bad amount it is, let me observe — will go quietly to sleep.
But an Irishman's joy is incomplete unless he knocks some-
body down, which may account for the fact that the Irish are
the best soldiers in the world.
One redeeming feature in the liquor traffic is the increasing
consumption of porter, for that at least has some nourishment
in it, and is reasonably wholesome, whereas the whisky is vilely
adulterated, not only by the publicans before it reaches the
consumer, but also in some of the factories.
Puck Fair is the great annual fete and mart of Killorglin ;
and it is so called because a goat is always fastened to a stave
on a platform, and gaily bedizened. Formerly the animal was
attached to the flagstaff on the Castle. To this fair all Kerry
for many miles congregates, and the neighbouring roads
DRINK 105
towards evening are literally strewn with bibulous individuals
of either sex.
On one occasion a Killorglin publican was in jail, and his
father asked for an interview because he wanted the recipe for
manufacturing the special whisky for Puck Fair, It has been
a constant practice to prepare this blend, but the whisky does
not keep many days, as may be gathered from the recipe,
which the prisoner without hesitation dictated to his parent : —
A gallon of fresh, fiery whisky. A pint of rum. A pint
of methylated spirit. Two ounces of corrosive sublimate.
Three gallons of water.
An Irishman's constitution must be tougher than that of
an ostrich to enable him to consume much of the filthy poison.
Temperance orators are welcome to make what use they like
of the recipe of this awful decoction, annually sold to a con-
fiding population.
It is not considered etiquette to come out of Killorglin
sober on Puck Fair ; and, judging by the state of the people
in the vicinity in the evening, this social custom is rigidly
observed.
They are wonderfully particular in Kerry in attending to
exactly what is congenial to them, and if it were not for the
thickness of their heads a good many lives would be lost.
There was a gauger, in a central county in Ireland, killed
by a blow on the head from a stick.
The man who struck him, in his defence, stated : —
' I did not hit him a very hard blow, and why the devil
did the Government make a gauger of a man that had a head
no thicker than an egg-shell t '
Mighty few of the Killorglin folk have egg-shell heads,
and the bulk of these do not come to maturity.
The avowed fact that lunacy is largely on the increase in
io6 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Ireland has been pronounced by the committee which sat on
the question in Dublin to be mainly due, not only to excessive
drinking, but to the assimilation of adulterated spirits.
Though the foregoing recipe furnishes a pretty fair example,
I certainly would not wager that it could not be beaten else-
where in Ireland.
For a long time the priests were entirely apathetic on the
subject, but latterly they are bestirring themselves, and are
doing their best to put down wakes, which simply mean one
or more nights of disgusting intemperance in the immediate
vicinity of the corpse.
Keening, by the way, is dying out, and what remains of
this curious, mournful waiting is now almost entirely in the
hands of old women who are experts in the art, and get
remunerated not only in drink but also in cash.
It is, however, possible that when I am deploring the
alcoholic tendencies of the Irishman, that these may be due to
his more vegetarian dietary, and not to any undue natural
craving for alcohol. This is borne out by the fact that no
Irishman will willingly drink alone, and that his potations are
in the shops where whisky and porter are sold for consumption
on the premises, or at fairs, markets, weddings, or wakes, to
the diminishing number of which I have just called attention.
The parish priest of Dingle recently stated in court that
in a population of seventeen hundred there were over fifty
licensed houses, and he rightly declared that all dealings in
licences should for the present be only by transfer, and that
for five years at least no new licences should be granted.
The argument so often heard against stopping licences is
that then more illicit drinking will ensue, but this does not
convince me that the redundant licences should be renewed.
My remedy would be to increase all renewals of licences
DRINK 107
to fifty pounds apiece, and to apply the diiFerence as com-
pensation to unrenewed licences. If a man fits up his house
as a shebeen, and has conducted it tolerably, he ought to
receive just compensation when his licence is cancelled owing
to there being too many in a district.
If this is not done, he would be the victim of as great a
robbery as was perpetrated on the unfortunate landlords by
the Land Act.
I have a yarn or two on the subject of drink which may be
appropriately related here.
Old David Burus, the steward at Ardrum, County Cork,
was a great character who had got inextricably confused
between the Council of Trent and the Trant family in the
vicinity, and no amount of explanation could ever enlighten
him. Directly he had begun to be jovial, he used to say : —
' My blessing on Councillor Trent, who put a fast on
meat, but not on drink.'
And he proved the devoutness of his gratitude by con-
scientiously getting drunk every Friday.
That recalls to my mind the case of the illustrious gentle-
man— also a fellow-countryman, I regret to say — who committed
burglary and murder when there was an opportunity, but re-
ligiously refrained from eating meat on Friday.
Reverting to David Burus : on one occasion I remonstrated
with him on the amount of whisky he drank.
' I did drink a great deal of whisky, and I would have
drunk more,' was his reply, ' if I had known it was going to
be as dear as it is now.'
He evidently regretted not having thoroughly saturated
himself with alcohol. It was the only way in which he could
have possibly increased his consumption.
He was wont to say that if he had known the trick Mr.
io8 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Gladstone was going to play on honest, God-fearing men,
with sound stomachs and a decent appetite, by imposing a
ten shilling duty on every gallon of whisky, he would have
drunk his fill beforehand, even if delirium tremens had been
the penalty.
Such hard drinking as his, and so calmly avowed, must,
even in the south of Ireland, be fortunately rare, for few con-
stitutions can stand conversion into animated whisky vats.
There was a farmer at Kanturk railway station who con-
fided to the stationmaster that he himself on the previous
evening had been as drunk as the very devil.
A parson on the platform, overhearing him, said : —
' You make a mistake, my friend, the devil does not drink.
He keeps his head cool for the express purpose of watching
such as you.'
The countryman replied : —
' You seem to be very well acquainted with the respected
gentleman's habits, your riverince.'
And then they walked ofF different ways.
Which reminds me of another clerical incident.
A parish priest within twenty miles of Tralee, who sub-
sequently left the Church — I will not say on account of
his thirst, though, as that was unquenchable, it no doubt
conduced to his retirement — came into the parlour of the
manager of the bank with two farmers to have a bill dis-
counted.
The manager, having ascertained the farmers were good
security, cashed the bill and gave the proceeds to the priest.
He was very much surprised on the following day at the two
farmers walking into his room with the money.
' What 's the meaning of this .? ' says he.
' Well, your honour, we could not stay in the parish, if we
DRINK 109
refused to join his reverence in the deal, which was sure to
be a very bad one for us. So we thought the best thing to
do was to get him a little hearty at his own expense on the
way home. And then we picked his pocket and have brought
the money to your honour, whilst he is cursing every thief
outside his parish, and will probably ask the congregation to
make up the amount next Sunday.'
And that is a true story, and as illustrative of the Irish
peasant as any you could ever get told to you.
A coffin-maker named Sullivan thrived in Tralee. He
received an order for a coffin for a man living about six miles
away from the town. It was not called for for a week, and
so he went out to the house where the man lay dead to inquire
the cause.
When he came back to Tralee, he said to a friend : —
' Who do you think I saw, Mick, but that scoundrel of a
corpse sitting in a ditch eating a piece of pig's cheek.'
That reminds me of another coffin story.
A man who lived in Cork was notorious for being always
behind time for everything. He knew his failing, and was
rather touchy about it.
One night, stumbling out of a whisky shop, he lurched into
a yard, fell against a door, which gave way, and finished his
slumbers peacefully in the shed, which was the storehouse of
an undertaker.
In the morning he awoke, rubbed his eyes in astonishment
at the strange surroundings amid which he found himself, and
after recollecting his own pet proclivity, as he ruefully surveyed
all the empty coffins, ejaculated : —
' Just my usual luck. Late for the Resurrection.'
Which recalls another tale : —
A man was dead drunk, so some friends, for a lark,
no REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
brought him into a dark room, lit a lot of phosphorus, and
made up one of their party in the guise of a devil before they
flung a bucket of water over their victim.
' Where am I ? ' asked the fellow, looking round ' skeered.'
' In hell,' retorted the devil, with exaggerated solemnity.
' Heaven bless your honour, as you know the ways of the
place, will you get me a drop of drink ? '
But a mere drop does not suffice as a friend of mine
found out.
He was wont to reward his car-driver with a glass of
whisky, and gave it to him in an antique glass, which did
not contain as much as cabby wished for.
' That 's a very quare glass, captain,' says he.
' Yes,' replied Captain Stevens ; ' that 's blown glass.'
' Why, Captain,' says the carman, ' the man must have
been damned short in the breath that blew that.'
This would no doubt have been the opinion of a Dublin
carman who was in the habit of bringing a present to an
acquaintance of mine from a lady living at some distance, and
being recompensed with a glass of grog. By degrees, how-
ever, the water grew to be the predominant partner in the
union within the glass, so at last he burst out in disgust : —
' If you threw a tumbler of whisky over Carlisle Bridge,
it would be better grog than that at the Pigeon House.'
Which being interpreted into cockneyism would read, ' If
you threw a glass of whisky over Westminster Bridge it
would be better grog than that at Greenwich Pier.'
Still all consumption of liquor is not confined to Ireland,
and I well remember when I was with Bogue in Scotland,
that one night he had a fellow-farmer of the very best type
to dine with him, and about ten o'clock, with much difficulty,
my man and I hoisted him into the saddle.
DRINK 1 1 1
An hour afterwards we heard a knock at the door, and a
voice rather quaveringly inquired : —
' Pleash, can you tell me the way to X., I have lost my
way ? '
The tracks next morning revealed he had been riding
round and round the house without once quitting the vicinity,
which was almost as bad as Mark Twain's famous nocturnal
perambulation with his pedometer, when he went on a tramp
abroad !
Of potation stories I could tell scores more, and the Tralee
Club has seen enough whisky imbibed within its walls to
drown all the members.
A quaint character named MuUane was at one time
steward, and decidedly astonished a member, who was a
total abstainer, by charging him in his bill for three tumblers
of punch.
'Well,' explained Mullane, 'it's this way. Some take six
tumblers, and some takes none, so I strikes an average — and
to tell you the truth, it 's mighty convenient for the great
majority.'
A quaint member of the club was Mr. Edward Morris.
He was extremely diminutive, and he wore an eyeglass. One
evening he was standing on the first landing, pondering in
a bemused state whether he could get downstairs without
falling, when a pursey little doctor trotted past him without
even touching the bannister.
This inspired Morris with courage, so he let go his hold
of the balustrade, whereupon he promptly fell on the physician,
and both rolled to the bottom of the stairs.
Thence in hiccuping tones were heard : —
' Waiter ! Waiter, put the glass in my eye, and let me
see who the scoundrel was who struck me.'
112 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
On another evening in the club, when he had imbibed
very freely, he ordered an additional glass of grog, and began
to moralise aloud, addressing it after this fashion : —
' Glass of grog, if I drink you now, you '11 cut the legs
from under me. And yet I want you, and I will not do
without you. So I know what I will do. I '11 go to bed
and I '11 drink you there, for I don't care a damn what you
do to me then.'
The indifference of a drunken man to subsequent conse-
quences was rather quaintly shown by that weird individual
Dr. Tanner, when he went up to Sir Ellis Ashmead Bartlett
in the lobby of the House of Commons, and abruptly
observed : —
' You 're a fool.'
Sir Ellis fixed him with his eyeglass, and, in disgusted
tones, replied : —
* You 're drunk.'
' I suppose so,' retorted the Irishman, ' but then I '11 be
sober to - morrow ' — in the most plaintive tone, then in a
crescendo of scorn — ' whereas you '11 always be a fool.'
Moreover as he slouched down the lobby, he was heard to
say : —
' If I do get a headache, I 've a head to have it in, not a
frame on which to hang an eyeglass.'
That is a political amenity on which I will not dwell.
Very little money-lending is to be heard of in the south of
Ireland, and in all my experience I only remember one case
in Kerry. Tenants in Ireland, however, have great horror of
breaking bulk, and many of them will do a bill for a neighbour
when they have deposits in the bank for themselves. As it is
a point of honour never to refuse a friend in this respect, you
can easily imagine the amount of ' paper ' which is fluttering.
DRINK 113
Even when a farmer has a tidy sum of money on deposit
with the bank at one per cent., if he wants to employ a sum
for a short time, say for the purchase of cattle, he prefers to
raise the money on a bill at six per cent.
That is to say, the bank is lending him his own money at
five per cent. — a truly Hibernian trait, which it would be
difficult to beat anywhere.
A bill for drink is not recoverable, but occasionally an
insidious publican will take a man's I.O.U. and sue on that.
One applied to me to help him to get the money from a
tenant.
* You must show me the account,' said I.
As 1 suspected, there was whisky in it, and I declined on
the spot.
All drink in Ireland is on cash down terms only.
If they gave tick, they would never recover the money,
and if every Irishman is a knowing scoundrel, the publican is
a trifle more knowledgable than the customer, whose brains
are besodden.
A man, who had been a servant of mine, started a public
near Tralee, and thinking he would get customers from the
other whisky stores, he gave tick. His popularity lasted just
as long as the tick did, and a week later he was broke. I do
not say so much about Tralee being able to support one
hundred and sixty liquor shops, because there is a little shipping,
but how Cahirciveen can enable fifty publicans to thrive is a
melancholy mystery to me.
I was animadverting once, at Dingle, on the topic, when
one of my labourers remarked : —
* It 's the gentry does the drinking.'
' Now that 's very curious,' said I, * for as there are only
two of us, and as I never touch spirits, the other must have
H
114 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
such a thirst that he 'd consume the bay if only it were made
of whisky.'
In these democratic days, it is as well to resist any undue
aspersion on the upper classes.
To pass any aspersion on the bibulous propensities of a
tenant of mine named Flaherty would be impossible. When
he was buying his farm, I told him the Government ought to
take him on very easy terms, when they became his landlords.
' And for why ? ' he asked.
' Because,' I replied, ' the duty you pay on the whisky you
drink is more than twenty times your annual rent.'
I had, however, one personal illustration of the drinking
propensity in Scotland, which I think is worth preserving.
It is some years now since I went to see a certain farmer who,
his wife told me, on noticing my approach, was compelled
to go upstairs to cool his head as it was after dinner. She
said this much in the same casual tone, as I should mention
that my wife had gone up early to dress for that meal.
Next, I heard heavy splashing of water, and then a crash
which portended that the farmer had fallen over the washstand,
making a fearful clatter.
In rushed the drab of a servant maid, perfectly indifferent
to my presence, shrieking : —
' O missus, come up, come up, the maister is just miracu-
lous among the chaney ! '
CHAPTER XII
PRIESTS
I HAVE been asked, since my friends became aware that I am
perpetrating my reminiscences, whether I was going to write
anything supplemental to Mr. MacCarthy's Priests and People^
and Five Tears in Ireland.
My reply was : —
' Certainly not.'
To begin with, I have many friends among Roman
Catholics, and plenty of cheery acquaintances among the
priests. Secondly, the state of feud and hostility on which
Mr. MacCarthy dilates is more likely to be found in Ulster and
Leinster than in Kerry, where the Roman Catholics form
more than nine-tenths of the population.
On one occasion, when a distinguished Englishman was
staying at Killarney House, I told him that he should go to
the north to see the strangest sight in the world — two races
hating one another for the love of God.
It is not my business to estimate what would happen in
Kerry if a few thousand rabid Orangemen were plumped down
among the present inhabitants ; but according to existing
circumstances creeds are not torn to tatters nor religion dis-
figured by strife and slander.
All the same, I am bound to say that the Roman Catholic
priests, when I was young, were much superior to those
>of to-day. They were drawn from a better class, because,
115
ii6 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
having to be educated at Rome, or, at least, as far away as
St. Omer, entailed some considerable outlay by their relatives.
Moreover, they brought back from their continental semin-
aries broader ideas than can be acquired in purely Irish
colleges. Their interest had been stimulated at the most
impressionable age in much of which the farmers and labourers
had na conception. Therefore the priest could address his
flock with authority, and was invariably looked up to as well
as obeyed.
The parish priest at Blarney erected a tower in commemora-
tion of the battle of Waterloo, and a public house in the vicinity
bears the name to this day.
What parish priest would raise a memorial to any English
victory in the twentieth century ?
The greatest curse to the Irish nation has been May-
nooth, because it has fostered the ordination of peasants^
sons. These are uneducated men who have never been out
of Ireland, whose sympathies are wholly with the class from
which they have sprung, and who are given no training cal-
culated to afford them a broader view than that of the narrowest
class prejudice.
As for the much discussed Irish university, I do not myself
believe it will be founded.
Should even an English Government be blind enough to
allow it, an Irish university could only become a hot-bed of
treason, and practically all educated members of the Roman
Catholic community would avoid sending their sons to such a
seminary of sedition, where the influence would be insidiously
directed to make the undergraduates even more hostile to
England than they already are by inherited instincts and by all
they have been told in their own homes.
On the very day this page is written, I have mentioned the
PRIESTS 1 1.7
question of an Irish university to two Protestants in the
Carlton, both Members of Parliament, and both approved of
the idea in a languid way. I have also mooted the topic
this afternoon to two leading Roman Catholics, and both
vehemently disapproved, alleging that it will work endless
mischief.
As far back as 1872 Dr. Macaulay wrote : —
* The Irish university question has been put off from year
to year, and at length presses for settlement.'
In the best interests of Ireland, may the same thing be
written thirty years hence !
If the Roman Catholics of England send their sons to
Oxford and Cambridge, why should not more Irish Roman
Catholics send theirs to Trinity College, Dublin .? Only a very
few do, although the education is said to be quite as good as
at either of the -great English Universities. A far tighter
hold is kept, however, on the Roman Catholic laity in Ireland
than in England. It always surprises English people to learn
that, in Ireland, Roman Catholics are not allowed to enter
Protestant churches to attend either funerals or weddings.
Nor do I think there is much probability of these restrictions
being removed.
Of course, in the years of outrage and terror in Ireland,
many of the priests from the altar denounced loyal members
of the congregation, or incited their hearers to deeds of
wickedness by their inflammatory sermons. These facts are
among the blackest in the history of any creed, and I do not
hesitate to class the work of some of the priests who disgraced
their Church with the worst perpetrations of the Spanish
Inquisition.
Fortunately all priests were not, and are not, after this
style. I have known many good and worthy men among
ii8 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
them, as well as capital fellows, fond of a joke. Moreover,
the Roman Catholic Church did not always take the side of
the Land League.
For example, the bishops and parish priests laboured
assiduously to get Lord Granard his rents from his estates
in Longford.
Why.?
Because Maynooth held a great mortgage on the property.
In the famous De Freyne case, the parish priest energeti-
cally assisted the landlord in every way in his power, because
the property was heavily mortgaged with Roman Catholic
charges.
These are two facts that occur to me on the spur of the
moment, and probably other people could supply similar
instances.
As for the Episcopacy, it was the violence of Dr. Walsh,
the Archbishop of Dublin, which prevented him from obtain-
ing the coveted cardinal's hat. This was given to Dr. Logue,
the Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of Ireland, a witty,
capable, clever man, who had such an inveterate habit of
taking snuff that he did so even when conversing with Queen
Victoria.
* It prevents me from sniffing out heresy,' he explained,
with a twinkle, * and so gives me an excuse for shutting my
eyes to the different views of my neighbours.'
The Queen was much amused, but the remark conveyed a
true view of Irish Catholicism.
The fact is, his bishop can do very little with a treasonable
man when once he has been inducted a parish priest ; and the
curate who obtains irregular fees, of course, panders even more
to the taste of his congregation. A bishop will haul up a
tonsured subordinate mighty sharp for any breach of ecclesi-
PRIESTS 119
astical duty, but when it comes to politics and instigation to
crime, he finds it far more difficult to keep a tight hand.
As a broad rule it may be stated that the bishops are well
selected, and are of a much higher type than the average priest.
Of the bishops of Killarney, Moriarty put down Fenianism
with no light hand, preaching, as I have already shown, in the
most manly and emphatic style — which could have been
emulated with advantage in other Episcopacies in my country.
MacCarthy was a bookworm from Maynooth, who played the
deuce with the diocese, allowing all the priests to run wild,
and by his laxity becoming criminally responsible for much of
the terrible condition of Kerry. Higgins was the nominee of
a friend of Moriarty, and he worked hard to suppress out-
rages, by which course he certainly did not add to his popularity
among his flock. In his upright and courageous conduct he
has been worthily emulated by his successor, Coffey, whose
demise occurred only in the present year,
Kerry possesses one bishop, fifty-one parish priests and
administrators, sixty-nine curates, and eleven priests occupied
in tuition.
There are six religious houses for males, and seventeen
convents, representing about five hundred inhabitants, as well
as three hundred students, which, with the occupants of
subsidiary sacerdotal establishments, is estimated to make up
1265 persons.
In 1 87 1, when the population of Kerry was 196,586, there
were 337 priests and nuns. In 1901, when the population
had become reduced to 165,726, the priests and nuns had
increased to 546.
And these statistics bring me to a salient point : —
The one reality above all others in Irish life is the grip of
the Church.
I20 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
In the last book which I have received from the library
— Paddy-Risky^ by Mr. Andrew Merry — one of the stories is
that of a poor widow beggaring herself in order to provide the
parish chapel with a bell, and that is the kind of thing you
hear of everywhere.
The Roman Catholic Church presides over every function
in the life of each member of its community, and the priest
charges heavily for administering the rites.
At a wedding he does not take a prescribed fee, but
makes a bargain, usually with the family of the bride. I
have known as much as twenty-five pounds paid to a priest at
a small farmer's marriage ; and the sum obtained is very often
out of all proportion to the dowry of the bride, or even to
the funds of the happy pair.
An example may be cited — the case of a labourer in my
own employ, who received forty pounds as his wife's fortune,
and had to pay eight to the parish priest.
It is the same thing with funerals, over which a ridiculous
amount is still spent, although the wake is falling into dis-
repute under the ban of the Church, and women are now
rarely hired to ' keen.' There is a craze to have a number of
priests attending the service, and a good many of them do go,
very well pleased, as to a picnic.
In parishes where the poverty is something appalling the
members of the congregation not only contribute Peter's
Pence, but you cannot go into the chapel without seeing some
tiny candles lighted before the altar of Mary, which must
literally represent the scriptural mites of the widow and
orphan.
Before I relapse into a few stories, let me say something
about the Protestant clergy.
They are nearly always recruited from the ranks of the
PRIESTS 121
smaller Irish gentry, and whilst, perhaps, richer in proportion
than many of the curates and incumbents in England, there
are no ' fat ' livings, and all are distinctly poorer since the
Disestablishment.
The average in Kerry, and over most of the south of
Ireland, is a stipend of two hundred pounds a year, which
involves reading services in two churches each Sunday, and
therefore puts the clergyman to the expense of keeping a
horse and trap.
About 1820 the district around Castleisland was divided
into three parishes — Castleisland, Ballincushlane, and Killeen-
tierna — the joint revenues of which were eighteen hundred
a year. These were vested in the Lord Bandon of the time,
who lived in the lovely cottage on the upper Lake of
Killarney.
He allowed a curate fifty pounds a year to do the joint
duties, and I hardly think the man was worth the money.
He subsequently obtained a Government living and was in
the habit of asking his congregation, as they went into church,
whether they wanted a sermon or not. The general concensus
of opinion was a polite negative — to the relief of all parties.
The method of electing a vicar in Ireland since the
Disestablishment is both sensible and practical.
Three parish nominators, one lay diocesan nominator, two
clerical diocesan nominators, and the bishop, between them,
choose the new incumbent. By the constitution of this Court
of Election, it is certain that no one will be appointed to whom
the parish objects, whilst if the parish desires the nomination
of an incompetent man, that is checked by the diocesan voters
in conjunction with the bishop.
In fact it is an admirable system, far better than the
patronage plan still rampant in England.
122 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
The Irish bishops are also chosen by nominators drawn
from the clergy and laity of the diocese, provided a two-thirds
majority be obtained for any one candidate. If not, the
Irish bench of bishops jointly selects the new wearer of
lawn sleeves.
This, again, works with perfect smoothness and never
arouses the ill-feeling aroused by the selections nominally
made by the Prime Minister. To-day the Foundations of
Belief may not be an essay which causes confidence in the
ability of the author to pick the best bishops, and all the
much-vaunted religious convictions of Mr. Gladstone did
not make his nominations to the Episcopacy particularly
successful. It is now no secret that Lord Cairns used to
choose bishops for Disraeli and that Lord Shaftesbury often
was consulted by Prime Ministers who knew more about
sport than clericalism.
So far as I can recollect, among all the Irish clergy I have
met not one was an Englishman, though there are plenty of
Irish in the English Established Church.
All the Disestablished Church of Ireland is exceedingly
anti-ritualistic.
' I do not want Mock- Turtle, when I am so near real
Turtle,' said Sir George Shiel, when asked to visit St. Alban's,
Holborn, one of the Ritualistic temples — an observation which
represents the feeling animating clergy and laity in Ireland,
though they are none the better pleased that out of the funds
of the Disestablishment, Maynooth should have received a
capitalised sum equal to the previous annual grant from
Government.
And now for just a few clerical tales.
A man was dying and the priest was with him.
' Ah, Father Philip,' said the poor fellow, * I am sure
PRIESTS 123
the likes of you would never be deceiving a poor man and
him on his deathbed. Tell me straight, is my soul all right ? '
* It is, my son, and in a very short time you '11 be in the
company of the Blessed Saints.'
'In that case, Father, I'll tell the devil he may just kiss
my toe and bad luck to him for all the trouble I have had to
get out of his clutches,' and the priest noticed his last sigh was
one of complete satisfaction — no doubt anticipatory.
Purgatory forms the foundation of many stories.
A certain very poor widow was paying the priest money
for the soul of her son, who was killed in a faction fight,
' And it 's more masses you must have Mrs. Murphy, for
Paddy has only got his red hair out of purgatory.'
Later, when she was asked for further contributions : —
' It 's his mouth which is out now, and he sends his mother
on earth messages to have prayers said to get him to heaven.'
A third time did Widow Murphy give the priest what she
could not in the least afford.
Yet again he reported progress.
' Now you must make a great effort, for his head and
shoulders are out of purgatory.'
' Then it 's devil another penny of mine will go for masses,
for if my Pat has his head and shoulders out, I can safely
reckon he '11 soon wriggle himself away entirely, God bless
the poor darling.'
Another purgatory tale, this time concerning Father Batt.
A fellow-priest came to see him, and over a friendly
glass : —
' And what 's the news ? ' asked Father Batt.
' None that I know on earth, but I do hear tell that the
floor of purgatory has given way and all the inhabitants have
fallen into hell.'
124 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
* Oh, the poor Protestants, that will be all crushed by the
weight atop of them,' was Father Batt's rejoinder.
Few priests in Kerry have been better known or more
beloved than he, almost the last of the old-fashioned school,
and he was always warm friends with his Protestant colleague
in Milltown, where he resided.
Father Batt invariably took a few tumblers of hot whisky
punch after dinner, and having got ill was advised by the
doctor to give it up and take to claret.
When the bishop met him some time later, he said : —
' Well, Father Batt, I am afraid you do not like claret so
well as the whisky.'
'It's this way, my lord,' he replied. 'I don't object
to the taste so much as I thought I should, but I find it
very tedious.'
It is with some diffidence that I venture upon a convent
story. To begin with, I am a Protestant, and secondly, in
relation to one of these ladies' clubs under sacerdotal patronage
I feel like Paul Pry, always apologetic when putting in an
appearance.
Still, the tale is quite innocent and is absolutely true.
The convent is in Kerry and up to recently the order had
been an enclosed one. But a papal edict arrived one day,
bidding the nuns go out to teach, and to collect, as well as to
relieve, the suffering in their own homes.
The Mother Superior was exceedingly wroth.
' What ! ' quoth she. ' Does the Holy Father want to be
interfering with me after I have been within these walls for
the last eight-and-twenty years .? I am not going to begin
tramping the roads at my time of life, not for the Holy Father
himself, no, nor all the Cardinals too. A pretty state of things
indeed. Why, he '11 be telling me to ride a bicycle next ! '
PRIESTS 125
The county of Cork was at one time so notorious for
cattle-stealing that a Roman Catholic bishop went down
specially to admonish them.
When telling one parish priest to be firm with his con-
gregation on the subject, the bishop observed : —
' Nothing is more clearly laid down in the Bible than that
if a man has possession of another man's property he can never
enter the kingdom of heaven.'
' The Saints preserve us,' exclaimed the priest ; * there '11
be plenty of empty houses there.'
It is not uncommon for a priest to get a bit of truth by
accident or by cunning from one of his flock.
The parish priest was congratulating a man who had
married three wives upon getting a bit of money with each,
and received this answer : —
' Well, your reverence, I did not do badly at all, but
between the weddings and the funerals, your reverence took
care it was not all clear profit.'
There is plenty of hard barter about the terms of these
ceremonies, and on one occasion at Brosna, when the curate
stood out for three pounds as his fee for performing the
marriage service, the would-be bridegroom held out a thirty
shilling note, saying : —
' Marry yourself to this, your reverence, and we '11 be
happy with your blessing.'
As the persuasive eloquence of another man could not
abate the price which his priest demanded for a funeral, he
blurted out : —
' Why, the blessed corpse in purgatory would shiver at
the thought of costing so much to put away, and we but poor
folk, with the pig that contrary we don't know whether the
litter will survive.'
126 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Here is a fish story connected with a member of my own
family, Miss Clarissa Hussey, who was my aunt, and also a
pious Roman Catholic. She used to hospitably entertain her
confessor Father Tom, a priest with a keen appreciation of
the good things of the table. Among his parishioners it was
known that he indicated the value he put on the coming fare
by the length of his preliminary grace.
On a certain Friday in Lent he dined with her, and on
a huge dish being put down in front of his hostess, he expected
a fine salmon, and shutting his eyes proceeded to pronounce
a benediction the length of which greatly gratified my aunt.
On the cover being removed, however, his face fell, and in
severe tones he rebuked her : —
* Was it for hake, ma'am, that I offered up the full
grace ? '
Nor could he be appeased all through the meal.
That leads me to relate the funeral sermon delivered by a
clergyman on a lady who had died suddenly at her morning
meal : —
' You all, dear brethren, well know the loss we have
sustained in our departed sister. She was ever alert and
kindly, ever bountiful though without extravagance. To the
last she preserved her characteristics. On the fatal morning
of her removal from among us, she rose as usual and came
to the family breakfast-table. With no premonition of what
was to come she took her egg-spoon and cracked her egg,
an egg laid by one of her own hens. In another moment
failure of the heart transferred her to a higher sphere. She
began that egg on earth, she finished it in heaven.'
CHAPTER XIII
CONSTABULARY AND DISPENSARY DOCTORS
An Englishman once asked me, if I could suggest any way
by which all Ireland could be made loyal. I inquired if he
thought the Irish constabulary a loyal body.
* Most decidedly,' said he, without hesitation.
' Then,' I replied, ' if you will pay every Irishman seventy
pounds a year for doing nothing, but look after other people's
affairs — a thing by nature congenial to him as it is — you'll
have the most loyal race on earth.'
That Englishman went away thoughtful, but I had shown
him the solution of one Irish problem which may be stated
thus : —
" Why do one half of the sons of farmers in Ireland, who
have been or are members of the Irish constabulary, represent
a body of men unequalled for their respectability, loyalty, and
courage, while a large proportion of the other, at least in the
eighties, made up the bulk of the ignoble army of moonlighters,
cattle maimers, and cowardly assassins crouching behind stone
walls to shoot at an unsuspecting victim in the opening ?
The answer is £ s. d.^ not an agreeable one, but truth is
not always composed of sweetstuff.
The constabulary are recruited from the sons of peasants
and farmers. They are drilled, disciplined, well fed, well
clothed, well paid, and show themselves well conducted.
During all the bad times, there was not a single case of a
127
128 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
disaffected man, though every sort of inducement must have
been brought to bear on them. The prevailing characteristic
of all ranks has been the high sense of duty, so that they
composed the most mobile and the most effective corps in
Europe.
As detectives, they have, however, proved quite ineffective,
because the peasant has everywhere been too shrewd for them ;
' yet the relative position of the police to the people, and
the intimate connection with America, marked it out as a force
peculiarly adapted to the prevention and detection of crime
committed in Ireland, but often inspired from America.' So
wrote one of the most experienced resident magistrates, Mr.
Clifford Lloyd, afterwards Minister of the Interior in Egypt,
and subsequently Lieutenant Governor of the Mauritius and
Consul at Erzeroum, where he died at the age of forty-seven.
The constabulary are enlisted without any consideration
of creed, but when Sir Duncan MacGregor was at the head of
the force he arranged that of the five men in every police
barrack, two should be Protestant, and three Roman Catholic,
or vice versa. This check has subsequently been swept away,
by no means to the advantage of the service.
Very recently the Inspector General, and the Assistant
Inspector General retired, and their places were filled by an
Englishman and an Irishman, neither of whom had been in the
force, which gave rise to great and well-founded dissatisfac-
tion. One of the pair is a warm friend of my own, but that
is no reason why I should approve of the appointment.
While the bulk of the officers are Irish gentlemen, educated
in Ireland, Englishmen are also to be found among them.
Officers enter by nomination after passing an examination
designed to show that they are not ' crammed,' but the per-
versity of the examiners has always thwarted this excellent
CONSTABULARY AND DISPENSARY DOCTORS 129
intention. That is like the admirable purpose of Cabinet
Ministers, bent on reforming their different departments, but
dexterously * blocked ' by the permanent officials.
Before the reduction commenced by Mr. Wyndham, the
Constabulary numbered 10,679, ^^^ ^^^^ ;C^'39'^'9^7- ^^
my opinion it will be found necessary in the future, not only
to keep the force up to its full strength, but to materially
increase its number so soon as the Government becomes the
sole landlord in Ireland, especially now that they are going to
have Volunteers in the country.
The existence of this force merely means that landlords
will be shot at half price ; so, for the sake of their own skins,
the latter had better get clear of the country before the
recruits have had much musketry instruction. The badness
of the shooting saved many a landlord in the eighties, and if
that is remedied, why they will be popped as easily as my
grandson knocks over rabbits.
There is a story of an English tourist seeking for informa-
tion about the distressful country, he being at Tallaght near
Dublin.
He asked his carman whether there were many Fenians
about.
' A terrible lot, your honour,' replied the fellow.
' I suppose a thousand ? ' the tourist suggested, somewhat
apprehensively.
' That is so, and twenty thousand more,' answered the
carman without hesitation.
' Are they armed ? ' was the next question.
' They are that, and finely into the bargain.'
' And are they prepared to come out ^ ' the tourist being
much perturbed, and thinking it would be his duty to write
to the Times.
I30 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
' Prepared to come out in the morning, your honour.'
' And why don't they do so ? ' with English common sense.
' Begorra, because maybe if they did, the constabulary
would put them in jail.'
So the constabulary have some value after all, in spite of
the sneers of Home Rule members in the House of Commons.
Half a dozen Kerry priests screeched with laughter when
I told them that story in the train, having met them on a
journey to Farranfore.
Here is another I also gave them on that occasion.
A couple of policemen were discussing the state of Ireland
once upon a time.
Says Dan to Mick : —
' Sure we '11 niver get peace and quiet in the blessed
country until we fetch Oliver Cromwell up from hell to
settle the unruly.'
Replies Mick to Dan : —
' Have done, you fool, isn't he a deal quieter where he is ? '
Judge Keagh thought worse of his fellow countrymen than
do other men with less than his great experience, and although
a Roman Catholic, he had to be escorted by two constables
wherever he went.
He was told that he ought to be guarded by four police-
men, because the two might be attacked.
But he knew the man that said it wanted to make the
protection more conspicuous, so he replied : —
' Sir, I have the most implicit confidence in the invincible
cowardice of my fellow countrymen.'
That recalls an observation of my own.
On one occasion, a telegram was sent from the Chief
Inspector of Constabulary in Kerry to the Scotland Yard
authorities to say there was to be an attempt to murder me
CONSTABULARY AND DISPENSARY DOCTORS 131
in London, and in consequence a gentleman from the depart-
ment for providing traffic directors in metropolitan streets
called at my house in Elvaston Place, to inquire what police
protection I wanted.
' None,' said I, ' for if a man shoots me in London he '11
be hung, and every Irish scoundrel is careful of his own
neck. It 's altogether another matter in Ireland, where Mr.
Gladstone has carefully provided that he shall be tried by a
jury, the majority of which are certain to be land leaguers.'
I brought out the same idea on a more important occasion.
Once, in Mr. Froude's house. Professor Max Miiller —
who was a great admirer of Mr. Gladstone — remarked that
after all I had not much reason to complain, because I had
had plenty of police protection in Ireland.
' I should prefer equal laws,' said I.
' What inequality of law have you to find fault with ^ '
he asked.
' Well,' I replied, ' if a land leaguer shoots me in Ireland,
he will be tried by a jury of land leaguers. If I shoot one
of them, I would require that I be tried by a jury of landlords,
and if that be granted I '11 clear the road for myself of all
suspicious characters, and ask for no more police protection
than you require at Oxford.
He subsided at that, and Froude laughed at him so
heartily, that he had not another word to say on the subject
all day.
Did you ever hear the rhyme about moonlighting ? It
runs as follows : —
'The difference betwixt moonlight and moonshine
The people at last understand,
For moonlight's the law of the League
And moonshine is the law of the land.'
132 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
That would have clinched my argument beyond all dispute,
but the expressive poem was not written at that time.
Reverting to the topics of this chapter, it is needless to
observe that there is a bond of connection between con-
stabulary and dispensary doctors, for the latter are needed
on many occasions to attend to the wounds of those just
arrested.
The dispensary doctors do not form a satisfactory feature
of Irish life, simply because the farmers elect individuals out of
friendship.
A dispensary doctor had to be appointed at Farranfore,
and I was most anxious to get the best man for the position.
So I proposed that the candidates' papers should all be sub-
mitted to Sir Dominic Corragun, a Roman Catholic physician
of high standing in Dublin.
I could not even get a seconder to my motion, which
therefore fell stillborn, and I wrote to Lord Kenmare that if
Gull or Jenner had been suggested, neither of them would
have obtained three votes.
Virtually the appointment of the dispensary doctor is
vested in the dispensary Committee, which is a local body,
usually consisting of one or more guardians, and four or five
specially elected ratepayers. In the same way are chosen
all the local sanitary authorities, who are of course under the
District Council.
You remember that Punch called the sanitary inspector
the insanitary spectre, but the beneficent climate of Ireland
fortunately averts all the evils his authority would not be
able to arrest if it came to really checking filth.
I remember the occasion of the election of another dispen-
sary doctor, when I was curtly told that only a moonlighter
could hope to be appointed.
CONSTABULARY AND DISPENSARY DOCTORS 133
My reply was : —
' I suppose it is easier for him to poison people when he
is drunk than to shoot landlords when in an inebriated
condition.'
I do know that a dispensary doctor not thirty miles from
Killarney was thrown out of his trap, because he drove the
horse through his own front door, when he was under the
intoxicated impression he was entering his stable yard.
He broke his leg, and as there was no one to set it,
he told his nephew to get a pail of plaster of Paris, and he
himself would tell him how to manage the operation.
First they had a glass of whisky to fortify them for
the ordeal, and then another, and after that a third to drink
good luck to the broken leg.
Finally, when they set about it, the nephew spilt the whole
pail of plaster of Paris over the bed in which his uncle lay,
and then fell in a drunken stupor into the mess. There they
both stayed all night until they were hacked out with a chisel
in the morning.
It is strange that the Irish, who are brimful of shrewd
sense, use no more discretion about appointing schoolmasters
than dispensary doctors.
The petty pedagogues, who are the Baboos of Ireland,
are drawn from the small-farmer class. There is great com-
petition among the incompetent to get lucrative posts in
my native land : they probably appreciate the Hibernian
eccentricity of giving important positions to the men whose
claims in any other country would never obtain a moment's
consideration.
There was a schoolmaster near Castleisland, who died of
sparing the rod but not sparing the potation. His family
were anxious his nephew should be appointed.
134 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
As he was an utter ne'er-do-weel, the parish priest justly
considered him unfit for the situation, and brought from a
neighbouring county a schoolmaster highly recommended by
the National Convention.
They had a quiet way of expressing their feelings in Kerry
in those days, and the moonlighters fired by night through
the windows of every one who sent their children to the
nominee of the parish priest.
The District Inspector thought he had better look into
the matter himself, for it was stated they had always fired high
with the sole purpose of intimidating the occupants of the
various cabins.
However, when this inspecting authority found a bullet-
hole in a window-sill only three feet from the ground, he
observed : —
' Well, that shot was meant to kill.'
One farmer standing by remarked : —
' It was not right to fire into a house where there were
a lot of little children.'
' Begorra,' cried another, in a tone of virtuous indignation,
* the careless fellows might have killed the poor pig ! '
That was sworn before me.
Here is another incident, also sworn to in my presence.
I must explain that the first poor rate was in 1848, and
half was made up by local subscription, while the rent was
added by the presentment of the county, and not paid out of
the rates. It was in those days a common practice for
dispensary doctors to put down on the list imaginary sub-
scriptions from friends, so as to draw more from the county.
A young fellow, whose name had thus been used, fired into
a Protestant doctor's house, and threatened to murder every-
body unless he was given some money.
CONSTABULARY AND DISPENSARY DOCTORS 135
He obtained half a crown, with which he bought a pint of
whisky and a mutton pie ; but just as he was putting his teeth
into the crust of the latter, he paused in horror.
* I was near being lost for ever, body and soul,' says he,
' this being Friday, and me so close on tasting meat.'
The woman in the place where he bought the provisions pro-
posed to keep the mutton pie for him until the following day.
He thanked her civilly, and went away, but had the mis-
fortune to mistake the police barracks for the rival whisky
store, and was promptly arrested for threatening with intent
to do injury.
The next day he asked to be allowed to eat his pie, which
is how the story came out.
The dispensaries are often worked with more attention to
the pocket of those on the premises than is compatible with
the principles of honesty, as recognised outside the legal and
medical professions. At one dispensary in Kerry the Local
Government Board was horrified at the consumption of
quinine — an expensive medicine. Tndeed, so much dis-
appeared that, if it had not been for the chronic aversion
of any low-born Irishman to outside applications of liquid,
it might have been surmised that the patients were taking
quinine baths. The matter was privately put into the hands
of the police, who within a week arrested the secretary getting
out of a back window with a big bottle of quinine, which he
meant to sell.
That man, for the rest of his life, inveighed against the
petty and mischievous interference with private industry
tyrannically waged by public bodies.
I should like to claim for Kerry the honour of being the
land where the following hoary chestnut originally was per-
petrated, the exact locality being Castleisland.
136 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
A landlord, who had returned in a fit of absent-mindedness
to his property after a sojourn in England, was condoling with
a woman on the death of her husband, and asked : —
'What did he die of?'
'Wishna, then, did he not die a natural death, your
honour, for there was no doctor attending him ? '
A not dissimilar story is that which concerns a Scotch
laird who had fallen very sick, so a specialist came from
Edinburgh to assist the local murderer in diagnosing the
symptoms.
The canny patient felt sure he would not be told what
was the matter, so he bade his servant conceal himself behind
the curtains in the room where the doctors talked it over, and
to repeat to him what they said.
This is what the faithful retainer brought as tidings of
comfort to the alarmed invalid : —
' Weel, sir, the two were very gloomy, one saying one
thing and the other another ; but after a while they cheered
up and grew quite pleasant when they had decided that they
would know all about it at the post-mortem.'
That recalls to my mind Sidney Smith's definition of a
doctor as an individual who put drugs of which he knew very
little into a body of which he knew considerably less.
There is a rare lot of truth in some witticisms.
For some illogical reason only known to my own brain —
perhaps with the desire of keeping up the fashion for incon-
secutive and rambling observations common to all books of
reminiscences — the foregoing stories suggest to my mind
the excuse made to me by a wary scoundrel for not paying
his rent.
' I had an illegant little heifer as ever your honour cast an
eye over, and who is a better judge than yourself, God bless
CONSTABULARY AND DISPENSARY DOCTORS 137
you ? But the Lord was pleased to take her to Himself, and
it would be flat heresy for me not to say He is not as good
a judge as your honour's self.'
There was an action brought against a veterinary surgeon
for killing a man's horse.
Lord Morris knew something of medicine, as he did of
most things, and asked if the dose given would not have killed
the devil himself.
The vet. drew himself up pompously, and said : —
' I never had the honour of attending that gentleman.'
' That 's a pity, doctor,' replied Morris, ' for he 's alive
still.'
The Government introduced into the House of Lords an
additional bill for the complication and confiscation of landed
property in Ireland.
Lord Morris said it reminded him of the bill a veterinary
surgeon sent in to a friend of his, the last item of which
ran : —
' To curing your grey mare till she died, los. 6d.'
Never was the Irish question more happily expressed than
in his famous reply to a lady who asked him if he could
account for disaffection in Ireland towards the English.
' What else can you expect, ma'am, when a quick-witted
race is governed by an intensely stupid one ^ '
Lord Morris told many stories, but for a change, here is
one told of him.
A Belfast tourist was riding past Spiddal, and asked a
countryman who lived there.
' One Judge Morris, your honour ; but he lives the best
part of his time in Dublin.'
'Oh yes,' says the other, 'that's Lord Chief Justice
Morris.'
138 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
' The very dead spit of him, your honour ; and I was told
he draws a thousand a year salary.'
' He has five thousand five hundred a year.'
' Ah, your honour, it 's very hard to make me believe
that.'
' Why don't you believe it ? '
' Because when he 's down here he passes my gate five
days in the week, and I never saw the sign of liquor on
him.'
Evidently the bigger salary the bigger profit to the whisky
distiller was the rustic's theory.
I have forgotten how the story came to my ears, but I told
it to Lord Morris, who much appreciated it.
Another Kerry story, not unlike one narrated earlier in
this chapter, runs thiswise : —
Two men came to order a coffin for a mutual friend called
Tim O'Shaughnessy.
Said the undertaker : —
' I am sorry to hear poor Tim is gone. He had a famous
way with him of drinking whisky. What did he die of? '
Replied one of the men : —
' He is not dead yet at all ; but the doctor says he will be
before the morning ; and sure he should know, for he knows
what he gave him.'
Sometimes, however, the patient is quite as clever as the
doctor,
A physician in Dublin had a telephone put in his bedroom,
and when he was rung up about half-past one on a freezing
wintry night, he told his wife to answer it.
She complied, and informed him : —
' It is Mr. Shamus O'Brien, and he wants you to come
round at once.'
CONSTABULARY AND DISPENSARY DOCTORS 139
The physician knew this to be purely an imaginary case of
illness, so not wishing to be disturbed, said to her : —
' Tell him the doctor is out, and will not be home till
morning.'
Unfortunately he spoke so near the telephone that his
remark was audible to the patient. So when the wife had
duly delivered the message, the answer came back : —
' If the man in your bed is a doctor, send him here.'
CHAPTER XIV
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS
It 's the proudest boast of my life that I am an Irishman, and
the compliment which I have most appreciated in my time was
being called ' the poor man's friend,' for I love Paddy dearly
though I see his faults. Yes, perhaps one of the reasons why
I love him is because I do see the faults, for the errors of an
Irishman are often almost as good as the virtues of an English-
man, and are far more diverting into the bargain. You must
not judge Paddy by the same standard as you apply to John.
To begin with, he has not had the advantages, and secondly,
there 's an ingrained whimsicality, for which I would not
exchange all the solid imperfections of his neighbour across
the Irish Channel.
You would not judge all Scotland by Glasgow, and so you
should not fall into the error of judging all Ireland by Belfast.
Kerry is the jewel of Ireland, and it is with Kerry that I have
fortunately had most to do in my life.
Whilst I am alluding to the mistake of generalising, let
me point out how erroneous it is ever, historically, to talk
of Ireland as one country. When Henry ii. annexed the
whole land by a confiscation more open but not more criminal
than that instigated by Mr. Gladstone, there were four per-
fectly separate kingdoms in the island. Now there are four
provinces which are quite distinct, and an Ulster man, or
a Munster man, or a Connaught man, knows far more, as
140
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS 141
a rule, of England, or even Scotland, than he does of the
other three provinces of his native isle. For one Ulster man
who has been in Munster, three hundred have been to Liverpool
or Greenock, and until lately there was no railway between
Connaught and Munster, so that you had to go nearly up
to Dublin to get from one to the other.
There is much that is incomprehensible to the Englishman
who comes among us taking notes, and not the least is that
no one wants his cut-and-dried schemes of reforming what
we do not wish to reform. As for conforming to his
method and rule by vestry and county council autocracy in
a methodical manner, it is utterly at variance with the
national temperament. Very often, too, the stranger falls
a victim to the Irishman's love of fun, and goes back hope-
lessly * spoofed ' and quite unaware what nonsense he is
talking when he lays down the law on Ireland far from
that perplexing land.
' Don't you want three acres and a cow ? ' asked an
enthusiastic tourist from Birmingham, soon after Mr. Jesse
Collins had provided the music-halls with the catch-phrase.
' As for the cow I would not be after saying it would not
be a comfort, but what would the pig want with so much
land ? ' was the peasant's reply.
And that suggests an opportunity to give as my opinion
that the most practical measure England could take to benefit
Ireland would be to drain the large bogs and so improve fuel.
In some places the bogs are likely to be exhausted, but in
others there is plenty of turf (turf, O Saxon, is not the grass
on which you play cricket or croquet, but is the Hibernian
for peat). Indeed, there is ample for all the needs of Ireland
for a hundred years to come, but it should not be used
in the shamefully wasteful way so often noticeable. It is
142 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
no excuse that the heat it contains is not so great as in
coal.
If coal were to run out in England, to what a premium
would turf rise in Ireland !
Formerly turf could be picked up free, and even now
it is very cheap, the chief expense to the consumer being
the cost of transport from the bog to the turf rick behind
the cabin.
The mineral rights of Ireland are most deceptive. There
are plenty of indications of minerals, but they are of too poor
a nature to warrant working.
Personally, I tried working coal-pits near Castleisland for
three months, and silver lead was worked for six months
near Tralee by a company which was more successful in
working its own way with the bankruptcy court. I firmly
believe the reputed mineral wealth of Ireland to be greatly
exaggerated, and should never advise any one to invest money
in a syndicate for its discovery. Smelting was largely per-
petrated in olden times in Ireland, which entailed cutting
down the oak forests, that then crossed the country, to obtain
fuel, the ore being brought from England. But the intro-
duction of the coke process in the north of England settled
that industry, which was one of the earliest Irish ones doomed
to extinction.
An Irish industry which as yet shows no sign of losing
its commercial importance is the blessed institution of matri-
mony, a holy thing which in Ireland is particularly beneficial to
the pockets of the priest, who pronounces the blessing, and
to the distiller, who sells the whisky, in which the future of
the happy pair is pledged.
The matrimonial arrangements of Irish farmers in Kerry
may sound queer to an English reader, but are the outcome of
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS 143
an innate, though unwritten, law that the whole family have a
vested interest in the affair.
For example, when the family is growing up, the farm is
handed over to the eldest son, who gives the parents a small
allowance during their lives, while the fortune that he gets
with his wife goes, not to himself, but to provide for his
younger brothers and sisters.
Hence, if the eldest son were to marry the Venus de
Medici with ten pounds less dowry than he could get with
the ugliest wall-eyed female in the neighbourhood, he would
be considered as an enemy to all his family.
A tenant of a neighbour of mine actually got married to a
woman without a penny, a thing unparalleled in my experience
in Kerry, and his sister presently came to my wife for some
assistance.
My wife asked her : —
' Why does not your brother support you ? '
And she was answered : —
' How could he support any one after bringing an empty
woman to the house ? '
There was a tenant of mine, paying about twenty-five
pounds a year rent, who died, and his son came to me to have
his name inscribed in the rent account.
I asked him what will his father had made.
He replied that he had left him the farm and its stock.
' What 's to become of your brother and sister ? ' says I.
' They are to get whatever I draw,' says he.
' That means whatever you get with your wife ? '
' That is so.'
' Well, suppose you marry a girl worth only twenty pounds,
what would happen then ? '
* That would not do at all,' very gravely.
144 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
* Is there no limit put on the worth of your wife ? '
' Oh,' says he, ' I was valued at one hundred and sixty
pounds.'
I found out afterwards he had one hundred and seventy
with his wife.
A tenant on the Callinafercy estate got married, and the
mother-in-law and the daughter-in-law did not agree. So the
elder came to complain to the landlord of the girl's conduct,
and after copiously describing various delinquencies with the
assistance of many invocations of the saints, she wound up
with : —
' And the worst of all, Mr. Marshall, is that she gives
herself all the airs of a three hundred pound girl and she had
but a hundred and fifty.'
Filial obedience in the matter of marriage is as uniform
in these classes in Kerry as it is conspicuous by its absence
in old English novels and comedies. The sons never kick at
the unions, the daughters are never hauled weeping to the
altar, while an elopement or a refusal to fulfil a matrimonial
engagement would arouse the indignation of the whole country
side.
Decidedly these marriages turn out better than the
made-up marriages in France. I will go further, and seriously
affirm my belief that the marriages in Kerry show a greater
average of happiness than any which can be mentioned. To
be sure there is the same dash after heiresses in Kerry that
you see in Mayfair, and the young farmer who is really
well-to-do is as much pursued as the heir to an earldom
by matchmaking mothers in Belgravia. But the subsequent
results are much more harmonious in Kerry, and though
the landlord's advice is often asked to settle financial diffi-
culties in carrying out the matrimonial bargains, less frequently
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS 145
is he called upon to settle diiFerences between man and
wife.
* Sure, he 's well enough meaning, your honour, with
what brains the Blessed Virgin could spare for him,' is
the sort of remark a wife will make on behalf of her lazy-
husband.
Fidelity is the rule ; so is reasonable give and take, though
each, being human, likes to receive better than to give. And
one thing which impresses a stranger is the rarity of ille-
gitimate children out of the towns. This is, of course, partly
due to the influence of the priests, but partly also to the innate
purity of the Irish character, as well as by the standard of
respectability : —
' Ah, he 's a strong man,' you will hear said of So-and-So.
' How do you prove that ? ' says I.
' Why, has he not his farm, and his family with one son
a priest, and one daughter in a convent, and he with a bull
for his own cows } '
Could you want more to get him on the County Council if
he has no conscience and a convivial taste in the matter of
whisky ?
There can be no doubt that the Irish take better care of
their children than the parents of similar position in either
England or Scotland. Cases of cruelty, which so constantly
disfigure the police courts in both the latter countries, are very
rarely heard in the sister isle.
It is true that in many cases they cannot do much for their
offspring, but what little they are able to do is done with a
good will and ungrudgingly.
I remember a Saharan explorer telling me that in the desert
he came across some tribe, stark naked, utterly poor, but all
on apparently affectionate terms. He was much impressed
K
146 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
with the love shown by the children of all ages for their
parents, and inquired what the latter did to inspire such
enviable emotion.
' We give them a handful of dates, when there are any.*
It was apparently their sole form of sustenance.
The Irishman is very good to his wife, although the
courting is a matter of business, as I have shown. Wife-
beating and even more ignoble forms of marital cruelty are
almost unknown.
This is surely a big national asset.
Furthermore, the Irish are a very moral people ; and this
in spite of the close proximity and confinement necessitated
by the crowded condition of many cabins.
I was going to add that the light food may have some-
thing to say to this, but as the Irish are not remarkable
for their small families, this would be an unwarrantable
aspersion.
Of course in the big towns there are women of no import-
ance, and Dublin has always borne rather a lively reputation
in this respect, though that in no way affects the general high
standard of morality.
The climate of the country, despite the moisture, is one
conducive to good health, owing to the absence of any extreme
vicissitudes.
It may be asked why, considering the overcrowding and
insanitary conditions of living in the miserable cabins, there is
not more disease, and my reply is that the peat which is burnt
is so healthy as to act as a disinfectant.
Indigestion, like lunacy, is, however, largely on the increase.
Nearly any old woman — or old man for the matter of
that — as well as a sad majority of younger people, will
tell you ; —
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS 147
* I have a pain in the stomach,' with the accent on the
second syllable of the locality.
This is due to excessive consumption of tea.
Nearly twenty times as much tea must be drunk now in
Kerry as in the early sixties, and so far as I can recollect tea
was unknown, not only in the cabins but among the farmers
until after the famine.
Fairly good tea is obtained, for the Irish will never buy
tea unless they are asked a high price, and for that price
they usually, owing to competition, obtain an article not too
perniciously adulterated.
What is highly injurious is the method of making
the tea.
A lot is thrown into the pot on the fire in the cabin in
the morning, and there it stands simmering all day long, that
those who want it may help themselves.
This is in sharp contrast to the method employed by
Dr. Barter, the famous hydropathic physician at Cork, one
of the cleverest men I ever met and one of the very few
who never permitted medicine under any circumstances, rely-
ing on water, packing, and Turkish baths, with strict attention
to diet.
He used to make tea by putting half a teaspoonful into
a wire strainer which he held over his cup, and pouring
boiling water upon the leaves, the contents of his cup be-
came a pale yellow, to which he added a little milk and
instantly drank it off, the whole process lasting but a few
seconds. I remember he equally disapproved of the Russian
method of drinking tea in a glass with lemon, of the fashion-
able way of letting the water * stand off the boil ' upon the
leaves in a teapot, and of the Hibernian stewing arrangement
alluded to above.
148 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Personally I regard all hydros as so many emporiums of
disease, an opinion in which I am singular, but that does not
convince me I am wrong.
A bailiff once went to St. Ann's Hydro to serve a writ,
and he told me afterwards that he served it on his victim in
a Turkish bath, remarking : —
* And your heart would have melted within your honour in
pity for the poor creature not having a pocket to put the
document in.'
Which observation recalls to my mind the story of a
gentleman in a Turkish bath asking a friend to dinner, and
saying : —
* Don't mind dressing ; come just as you are.'
Another misunderstood answer was that of the absent-
minded man who entered a hansom and began to read a paper.
' Where to ^ ' at last cabby asked laconically.
' Drive to the usual place.'
' I 'm afraid I have too much on the slate there, sir, unless
you pay my footing.'
' Oh, go to hell,' retorted the other in a rage.
* It 's outside the radius, sir, and it will be a steep pull for
my old horse after we've dropped you.'
The light-heartedness of the Celt is another feature which
strikes the least observant stranger.
An Irishman has been described as a man who confided his
soul to the priest, and his body to the British Government,
whilst he holds himself devoid of any vestige of responsibility
for the care of either.
Here is another tale, illustrative of his contentment.
A philosopher, in search of happiness, was told by a wise
man that if he got the shirt of a perfectly happy man and put
it on, he would himself become happy.
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS 149
The philosopher wandered over the world, but could find
no man whose happiness had not some flaw, until he fell in
with an Irishman ; with whom he promptly began to bargain
for his shirt, only to find he had not one to his back.
From philosophy to the deuce is not a big stride, according
to the view of those folk who jibe at political economy and
all the abstract of virtues and governments. So, on the tail
of their fancy, I am reminded of another story about the
devil — a very large number of Irish stories are connected
with him, because in a very special sense he is the un-
authorised patron saint of the sinners of the country, and
he has had far too much to say to its government into the
bargain.
An Englishman, in the witless way in which Saxons do
address Irishmen, asked a labourer by the wayside : —
* If the devil came by, do you think he would take me
or you ^ '
The labourer never hesitated, but replied : —
' He 'd take me, your honour.'
' Why do you say that ? '
' Oh, he would,* says he, * because he 's sure of your honour
at any time.'
The Irishman is not so black as he may seem to the
Saxon, who reads with disgust the horrors that mar the
beauty of the Emerald Isle, and I should say that his finest
trait is patience under adversity. No nation, for example,
could have more calmly endured the terrible sufferings of
the famine, more especially as the high-strung nerves of the
Celt render him physically and mentally the very reverse of
a stoic.
Again, in no other nation are the family ties closer.
The first thought of those who emigrate to America is to
ISO REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
remit money to the old folk in the cabin at home. So soon as
the emigrants have obtained a reasonable degree of comfort
they will send home the passage money to pay for bringing
out younger brothers or sisters to them.
Did you ever hear the story of the homesick Kerry
undergraduate at Oxford, at his first construe with his
tutor, translating contiguare omnes as * all of them County
Kerry men ' ?
It was a true home touch, though not exactly a classical
reading of the passage.
In the same way, in my boyish days at Dingle, we all
of us firmly believed that King John had asked in what part
of Kerry Ireland was. That question was our local Magna
Charta, though what the origin of the tradition was I have
no idea.
But then things do differ according to the point of view,
and ours of history was not stranger than many others of
far more importance.
As an example of lack of comprehension I would cite the
following incident.
An English gentleman was shooting grouse in Ireland.
He got very few birds, and said to the keeper : —
' Why, these actually cost me a pound apiece.'
' Begorra, your honour, it 's lucky there are not more of
them,' was the unexpected answer.
This allusion to sport reminds me of the Frenchman's de-
scription of hunting in Ireland, which was to the effect that
about thirty horsemen and sixty dogs chased a wretched little
animal ten miles, which resulted in seven casualties, and when
they caught the poor beast not one of them would eat him.
The French do not always appreciate our institutions.
One of them landing at Queenstown in the middle of the
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS 151
day asked if there was anything he could amuse himself with
between then and dinner-time.
' Certainly,' said the waiter ; * which would you like, wine
or spirits ? '
By way of amusing the reader, before going any further, I
wiU give him a chance of reading a genuine, but unique
testament in which I figured, and which is not a bit more
queer than many which have been as formally proved.
' I Robert Shanahan in my last will and testament do make
my wife Margaret Shanahan Manager or guardian over my
farm and means provided she remains unmarried if she do
not I bequeath to her 2 shillings and sixpence I leave the
farm to my son Thomas Shanahan provided he conducts
himself if not I leave the farm to my son Robert Shanahan
I also wish that there should be a provision made for the rest
of the family out of the farm according as the following
Executors which I appoint may think fit Mr. Hussey Esq.
Revd. Brusnan P.P. and James Casey of Gorneybee. Given
under my heand this 7th day of February 1872.
his
Robert X Shanahan.
mark
Witnessed by
John O'Brien.
Jeremiah Connor.'
I have a few tales to tell of Kerry landlords, a race who
would have furnished Lever with a worthy theme, men as
humorous as they are brave, as diverting as they can stand,
loyal to the Crown despite much disparagement, and proud
to be Irishmen, though so unappreciated by the paid agitators
and their weak tools.
152 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
However, as I wish to be on good terms with all my
neighbours in this world, and with the ghosts of the departed
ones when I meet them in the next, I am not going to give
many names or rub up susceptibilities.
Of Kerry landlords, Lord Kenmare naturally suggests
himself to be first mentioned. He has been somewhat
unjustly attacked more than once about the condition of
Killarney as though the town was his private property. As
a matter of fact, he is utterly powerless there, as it was all
leased away for five hundred years by his grandfather. About
the town the following may be worth telling : —
A very neat plan was drawn up for improving it, which
included a gateway between every double block of houses to
lead down to the stables and garden, but as it was not thought
necessary to put a subletting clause into the lease, the actual
consequence was that all these passages were converted into
filthy lanes. Outside the town Lord Kenmare has built some
nice cottages, but within its confines he could effect nothing.
To show you how short-lived is Irish gratitude, ponder
over this : —
When Mr. Daniel O'Connell, son of the great Dan, stood
for West Kerry as a Unionist, he was warned by the police
officer that he could not be answerable for his life if he came
into Cahirciveen, for he had only twenty constables to protect
him ; and his wife — a most charming woman — when driving
through the town was surrounded by an insulting mob,
members of which actually spat in her face.
That reminds me of a similar experience which befell the
wife of Mr. Cavanagh, the man without arms and legs, who,
until denounced by the Land League, was exceptionally
popular.
Mrs. Cavanagh was walking along the road in Carlow,
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS 153
carrying broth and wine to a poor sick woman, when she
found herself the target for a number of stones and had to
run for her life amid a shower of missiles.
Despite his exceptional infirmities Mr, Cavanagh could
do almost anything. He used to ride most pluckily to hounds,
strapped on to his saddle. On one occasion the saddle turned
under him, and the horse trotted back to the stable-yard, with
his master hanging under him, his hair sweeping the ground,
bleeding profusely ; he merely cursed the groom with emphatic
volubility, had himself more safely readjusted, and then rode
out once more.
He always wore pink when hunting. One day a pretty
child of ten years old was out with her groom, who followed
the scent so ardently, that he forgot all about his charge,
who was left behind, and finding herself lost in a wood, began
to cry.
Suddenly there swooped out on a very big horse, the
armless and legless figure of Cavanagh in his flaming coat, and
seeing her predicament, he seized her rein somehow — she
never seems quite clear how — saying : —
* Don't be frightened, little girl, for I know who you are,
and will take care of you.'
He was as good as his word, but the high-strung, sensitive
child, so soon as she was in her mother's embrace, went from
one fit of hysterics to another, crying : —
* Oh, mummy, I 've seen the devil, I 've seen the devil.'
In after years they became great friends, and he often
dined with her after she married and settled in London.
Reverting to Lord Kenmare, the following story, which in
another version recently won a railway story competition in
some newspaper, really pertains to his son Lord Castlerosse.
On a line in Kerry there is a sharp curve overhanging the
154 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
sea. An old woman in a great state of nervous agitation was
bundled at the last moment into a first-class compartment.
Lord Castlerosse, the only passenger in the compartment,
by way of relieving her obvious agitation, tried to calm her
by telling her she could change at the next station.'
' Is it me that can be aisy,' she replied, ' when it 's my Pat
is driving the engine, and him having a dhrop taken, and
saying he '11 take us a shpin round the Head ? '
After all, to my mind, for sheer humour of a quiet sort,
nothing beats the observation of the late Sir John Godfrey,
who never got up before one in the day, and invariably break-
fasted when his family were having lunch. Being asked one
day to account for this rather inconvenient habit, he replied : —
'The fact is, I sleep very slow.'
I commend this to every sluggard who wants an excuse to
resume his slumbers when awakened too soon.
There was a gentleman who had rather a red nose, and
some one remarked that it was an expensive piece of painting,
to which some one else significantly added, that it was not a
water-colour.
' No,' said Sir John, ' it was done in distemper.'
One night a landlord in Kerry, who shall be nameless,
though he has passed over to the great majority, went to bed
without having much knowledge how he got there.
Two of his sons crept to the neighbouring town, un-
screwed the sign outside the inn, and put it at the end of their
parent's bed.
When he awoke, he looked at the sign for some time in a
bewildered way. Then he observed aloud : —
* I thought I went to sleep in my own bed, but I 'm
d d if I have not woke in the middle of the street.'
A certain roystering gentleman named Jack Ray got
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS 155
drunk and fell asleep in the woods of Kilcoleman. Some of
the Godfrey boys, seeing him prostrate and with foam on his
lips, ran to summon their father, saying to him : —
* There 's a man dead in the wood.'
Sir William hastened to the spot, and having put on his
glasses to get a view of the corpse, observed : —
* Come away, my boys, this man dies once a week.'
Another Kerry landlord, who was also a baronet, dealt
with the National Bank, the local manager of which was an
arrant snob, who loved a tide, and bored everybody with his
pretended intimacy with the impecunious baronet. But at
last even his patience was exhausted, and he sent the squire
a pretty stiff letter about the arrears due.
The other received the letter at breakfast, and showed it
to his son just come down from a University, who whistled
and ejaculated : —
' O tempora ! O mores ! '
His father instantly retorted : —
* You get me the temporary, and I '11 promptly see we
have more ease.'
In the bad times, an old woman came into the office at
Tralee to pay her rent. Mr. Francis Denny was in a real
bad humour with somebody else who had defaulted, and he
was raging along in a manner qualified to display his intimate
acquaintance with the florid embellishments of the language.
The old woman listened with evident admiration for some
time. At last she ejaculated : —
' Ah, the nate little man.'
And with that slipped out, without settling her account.
Mr. Francis Denny has the misfortune to be rather lame,
and one day another old woman, who liked him, observed : —
' If he had two sound legs under him, there 'd be no
156 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
holding him in Tralee, but he 'd be up at the Castle setting
the Lord Lieutenant right in his many errors, not to mention
going over to London to give the Queen herself a bit of his
mind.'
In the bad times, one lady was left in her Kerry residence
with her baby boy and a pack of maidservants, her husband
having been called over to England.
She had sixty pounds of gold in her bedroom, and one
night a housemaid rushed in to say a party of moonlighters
were in the house.
The lady threw a sovereign and some silver on to the
dressing-table, and hid the rest under her mattress.
In came the masked scoundrels asking for gold, and when
she pointed to the money that was visible, one replied that it
was not enough.
' Very well,' she said, ' give me your name and I '11 write
you a cheque.'
On that they left precipitately, to her intense relief.
All moonlighters calculated upon the terrorism their
appearance would cause, and if this was apparently conspicuous
by its absence they were nonplussed, because they never felt
over secure in their own hearts at the best of times, and grew
frightened directly others were not frightened by them.
In all moonlighting affrays no one scoundrel ever became
personally conspicuous as a leader, and all the wisest leaders,
such as Stephens, Tynan, and Parnell, shrouded their move-
ments in mystery. Fenianism in Ireland since Emmett has
never had one capable leader possessing the physical courage
to show himself in the forefront on all occasions.
On the other hand, it is a singular fact that nearly every
general of note in the army of the United Kingdom, since
the time of Marlborough, has come from Ireland. The Duke
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS 157
of Wellington was born in County Meath, Lord Gough in
Tipperary, Lord Wolseley in County Carlow, Lord Roberts
in Waterford, Sir George White in Antrim, General French
in Roscommon, and Lord Kitchener in Kerry.
The attempts of the English Government to manufacture
an English general in the South African war were a miserable
fiasco. They only produced one, Sir Charles Tucker, and
he did his best to atone for the accident of his English birth
by marrying a Kerry lady.
I had the pleasure of meeting Sir Redvers Buller in
Killarney, and after he had been there a couple of days he
proceeded to describe Kerry to me, who had been managing
one fifth of it for several years. His agricultural reforms
would have been as drastic as they were ludicrous had any one
attempted to carry them out, but when expatiating on them to
me, he was not even aware that there was any difference
between an English and an Irish acre. When I heard that
he was taking charge of the whole army in South Africa, I
mentioned that as he had been unable to command three
hundred constabulary in Kerry, I was sceptical of his ability to
manage the British army. He was without exception the
most self-sufficient soldier I ever met, and his subsequent
career has not made me change my view.
Here is a soldier story which is mighty illustrative of
Irish traits.
A peasant's son in Limerick enlisted in the militia for a
month's training, for which he received a bounty of three
pounds. With part of this money he bought a pig and gave
it to his father to feed up. When the pig was fattened,
the father sold it and declined to give him the price. So the
son was seen by the police to take his father by the throat,
saying : —
158 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
* Bad luck to you, old reprobate, do you want to deprive
me of my pig that I risked my life for in the British Army ? '
Everywhere I like to slip into this book instances of the
injuries suffered by Irish landlords, so here is another case
a propos des bottes, if you will forgive it.
The Knight of Kerry let nine acres of land to a tenant for
a rent of forty-five pounds. Having expended a large sum of
money in roadmaking and fences, at the tenant's request, he
also borrowed thirty-five pounds to build a small house for
which he has to pay thirty-five shillings per annum. The com-
missioners cut down the rent so heavily, that it has resulted
in the landlord having to pay five shillings a year for the
pleasure of looking at the man in occupation of his land.
Reverting to my reminiscences — or rather to what are for
myself less interesting portions, for I am a land agent by
profession and an anecdotist only by habit — I remember that
an Englishman subsequently a Pasha commanded the coast-
guard at Dingle in 1856, and then had an encounter with a
local Justice of the Peace in which he came off second best.
Captain occupied the Grove demesne. The J. P.,
who had been a Scotch militia officer, had been in the habit of
shooting crows over the demesne, and continued to enjoy the
sport, to which the Captain strongly objected. After an angry
correspondence the J. P. sent a challenge, which the other
did not seem to stomach, for he sent an apology by a
subordinate with full permission to continue the immolation
of the birds. If a cruiser had to capitulate to this bold
blockade runner, the Captain himself had to endure a similar
humiliation at the hands of an indignant Kerry man, though
he was very popular in Dingle.
There is nothing pusillanimous about the Irishman, except
when in cold blood he was expected to attack an agent, or
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS 159
landlord, or policeman, armed to the teeth. In such cases, he
remembered that his parents, by the blessing of the Holy
Virgin, had endowed him with two legs, and only one skin,
which latter must therefore be saved by the discretionary
employment of the former.
In other cases he is very brave, especially in verbal
encounters. Fighting is in his blood. That is what makes
the Irish soldier the best in the world, and that was why he
used to revel in the faction fights. As a paternal Govern-
ment now prevents the breaking of heads, at all events on a
wholesale scale, the pugnacious instincts of the nation have to
be gratified by litigation, and certainly there never was such a
litigious race in history as the contemporary Ireland.
I know of a case on the Callinafercy estate, where a widow
spent fifty pounds ' in getting the law of ' a neighbour whose
donkey had browsed on her side of a hedge. She took the
case to the assizes, and when the judge heard Mr. Leeson
Marshall was her landlord, he said :- —
' Let him decide it. He 's a barrister himself, and can
judge far better than I could on such a subject.'
To this there are literally hundreds of parallels every
year. Readers of La 'Terre will remember how much of
the funds went into the hands of the lawyer who thrived on
the animosities of the family, and that sort of thing is con-
stantly reduplicated in Kerry.
' I 'd sell my last cow to appeal on a point of law,' I once
heard a Killorgin farmer say ; and that is typical of all the
lower classes in the South and West.
As for the solicitors, I am not going to say a word about
them, good or bad : there are men no doubt worthy of either
epithet in a profession that preys on the troubles of other folk.
But I will tell one very brief story on the topic.
i6o REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Outside the Four Courts, a poor woman stopped Daniel
O'Connell, saying : —
* If you please, your honour, will you direct me to an
honest attorney ? '
The Liberator pushed back his wig and scratched his head.
' Well now, you beat me entirely, ma'am,' was his answer.
He had more experience than me, being one.
Talking of the Four Courts reminds me of Chief Baron
Guillamore, who had as much wit as will provoke ' laughter in
court,' and a trifle over that infinitesimal quantity as well.
A new Act of Parliament had been passed to prevent
people from stealing timber. A stupid juryman asked if he
could prosecute a man under that act for stealing turnips.
* Certainly not, unless they are very sticky,' retorted the judge.
His brother was a magistrate, and committed a barrister in
petty sessions for contempt of court. An action was brought
against him, but the Chief Baron raised so many legal excep-
tions, that it had finally to be abandoned through the fraternal
law-moulding. This action was pending in the civil court,
when a lawyer was very impertinent to the Chief Baron in
the criminal. Instead of committing him, the Chief Baron
said very quietly : —
' If you do not keep quiet, I shall send to the next Court
for my brother.'
Another judge had applied for shares in a company of
which a friend of his was secretary. Meeting him in Sackville
Street, he stopped him to inquire what would be the paid-up
capital of the concern.
The other forgot whom he was addressing, and blurted out
the truth by replying : —
' Well, I really cannot tell you just yet, but the cheques
are coming in fast.'
IRISH CHARACTERISTICS i6i
The judge withdrew his application by the next post, and
confidently expected to see his friend in the dock. I believe
in less than six months he was not disappointed.
The poorer class in Ireland do not appear to be business-
like in the ordinary sense, however much they may develop
commercial instincts after emigrating. It is to promote the
latent capacity obviously within their power that creameries
and other assisted promotions have been started in various
parts of the country, sometimes with great success. Sir
Horace Plunkett and others have dealt with all this in the
most serious spirit. I prefer to allude to it, and add one
anecdote.
A lady asked a respectable old woman how her son was
getting on as manager of the creamery, and the reply came
after the following fashion : —
' Whisna the poor man and all the trouble he has, and
him never able to make the butter and the books scoromund,'
which, being translated, is ' correspond.'
Another example I can cite of the difficulty in getting
people to put their intelligence to practical use in the south
is to this effect : —
There was a certain widdy woman in a neighbouring
parish who was making great lamentation over her * pitaties '
to the priest, and in consequence he lent her a machine for
the purpose of spraying them. She professed the profoundest
gratitude as well as interest in the implement, but the task
speedily became too big an effort, for she subsequently in-
formed me that she had sprayed * half the field to plase his
Rivirence, but left the rest to God.'
And that is the kind of negative piety which is distinctly
a characteristic Irish trait.
CHAPTER XV
LORD-LIEUTENANTS AND CHIEF SECRETARIES
Any Irishman who has reached the shady side of threescore
years and ten must remember many Lord-Lieutenants — the
pompously visible symbols of much vacillating misdirection.
To analyse them would be the work of an historian, to
criticise would be superfluous. They have been so many
Malvolios, all alike anxious to win the favour of that
capricious Lady Olivia Erin, and not one of them has
succeeded, though several have merited better fortune than
they met with on Irish soil.
The first Lord-Lieutenant I personally met was Lord
Carlisle.
He was a gentleman, but not otherwise remarkable. He
had come into the Government on the resignation of the
Peelites, and his popularity in Ireland was greater than any
other holder of the post in the century, possibly owing to his
negative qualities, and also to a charm of manner more effusive
than usual among Englishmen.
He had a habit of dropping his state, and going about
Dublin, if not like Haroun Alraschid, at least with the
independence of men in less august positions.
On one occasion, needing some local information, he went
to see the Lord Mayor of Dublin, but finding him out, was
given the address of an alderman who could tell him what he
wanted to know.
102
LORD-LIEUTENANTS— CHIEF SECRETARIES 163
The alderman was not in either, but his wife was, and
begged him to stop to lunch, which was just being served.
Lord Carlisle told her he hardly ever ate lunch, and was
not in the least hungry.
But under pressure he sat down to the meal, and got on
very well with it, whereat the lady remarked : —
' You see, your Excellency, eating is like scratching : when
you once begin it is hard to stop.'
His predecessor. Lord Clarendon, had been in office when
Lord John Russell, the Prime Minister, urged on the House
of Commons a bill for the abolition of the Lord-Lieutenancy.
The great point that he made was that the Chief Secretary
might become a mayor of the viceregal palace, a thing that
has now long been the case, for the Lord-Lieutenant has to be
a plutocrat of high descent, and the Chief Secretary is the
virtual administrator of Ireland — a thing unknown, however,
until the advent of Mr. Foster. The second reading was
carried by a majority of over a hundred and fifty, but it
was then dropped.
The story went that the Duke of Wellington had
suggested to Prince Albert the possible diminution of respect
for the Crown in Ireland without a visible representative, and
the Teutonic mind could not endure such a notion.
Lord Clarendon upheld the dignity of his position, though
he was liked by neither party in Ireland. He is the only Lord-
Lieutenant who ever administered sharp discipline to the
Orangemen — who regard their loyalty as permitting them a
good deal of licence — for he removed the name of their
leader. Lord Roden, from the Commission of the Peace
because he encouraged a turbulent procession at Dolly's Brae,
With his pompous manner he made a very Brummagem
monarch, quite indifferent to his unpopularity. As a matter
i64 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
of fact, some allege that all Lord-Lieutenants are hated by the
disloyal section of the populace, and if they go through the
farce of currying popularity, they can only do so by largely
patronising about a dozen shopkeepers, who eventually curse
because yet more has not been spent. But this is altogether
too limited to be true.
Lord Kimberley followed Lord Carlisle. In those days
he was Lord Wodehouse, and the Fenians used to issue mock
proclamations, in ridicule of his, signed ' Woodlouse.' He
was an experienced parliamentarian — a man who held office
for many years, and worked conscientiously, according to
his lights.
In Ireland he always appeared to be a naturalist, perplexed
at not understanding the species among which his lot was for
the time cast.
His mother was subsequently married to Mr. Crosbie
Moore, and she ran away with Colonel Fitz-Gibbon, after-
wards Lord Clare.
Mr. Crosbie Moore had not much sense of humour, as the
following tale will show.
He was presiding at Ballyporeen Petty Sessions, when a
village tailor was summoned for having his pig wandering on
the road.
The fellow pleaded that it was due to great curiosity on
the part of the pig, who saw some constabulary passing by, and
rushed out to see what they were like.
He made this explanation in such humorous fashion
that most of the magistrates were for letting him off; but
Mr. Crosbie Moore said it was scandalous that they had
directed the police to summon people on that very ground,
and they wanted to acquit the culprit because he had made
a joke.
LORD-LIEUTENANTS— CHIEF SECRETARIES 165
The rest of the Bench had to acquiesce, and the tailor was
fined one shilling.
He paid his shilling, and said : —
' t have no blame to you at all, gentlemen, except to Mr.
Crosbie Moore ; and, indeed, if he reflected, he should have
known that no live man could keep a woman or a pig in the
house when she wanted to be off.'
A subscription raised for him outside the Court realised
twenty-three shillings.
Tradition goes that when Lord Kimberley, Lord Carling-
ford, and Lord Granville were all in Mr, Gladstone's Cabinet,
Mr. Chamberlain — then at the Board of Trade — in a moment
of vexation called them ' Gladstone's grannies,' and if the
phrase is not his, it most certainly was apt and truthful.
Lord Kimberley was known as ' Pussy ' among a gang of
disrespectful subordinates. He really did as little to earn
respect as he did to forfeit it ; in fact he was a pre-eminently
respectable mediocrity of the kind that, towards the close of
the mid- Victorian period, clung like barnacles to office, and
he was a Whig during the period that Whiggism was growing
obsolete.
The Duke of Abercorn certainly had no tendencies
towards the lavish extravagance by which a modern Lord-
Lieutenant has to pay his footing, A short time before he
was chosen he had claimed the Dukedom of Chatelherault in
France, and was known in consequence among the malcontents
as the ' French Frog.' His wife was the daughter of one
Duke of Bedford, and when another came to stay at the vice-
regal, it was for a time called the ' Dukeries.' The A.D.C.'s,
who were particularly good-looking, were at once known as
the ' Duckeries.'
The Duke of Marlborough settled down well to his work.
1 66 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
He was frankly the friend of the landlords, and did his best
for them. But he brought no English politicians in his train ;
he never thought he could settle every Irish question after he
had smoked a pipe over it ; and he was never inaccessible.
He came on a visit to Muckross when Sir Ivor Guest had
the shooting, and I dined there to meet him. He visited
Killarney on several occasions, and on each of them I had long
talks with him. I always thought him a painstaking, well-
meaning man.
Lord Cowper was an honest nonentity who left the
country in disgust because he was not backed up by the
Government. Several modern figureheads would be very
much surprised at any Government expecting them to do
more than ' understudy Royalty.' But Cowper thought
himself a diplomatist ; was fond of authoritatively laying
down the law on continental affairs, as though he had the
refusal of the Foreign Office in his pocket ; and felt he ought
to have as much support as Palmerston obtained from the
various Cabinets he burdened with European embroglios.
However, Lord Spencer, on being reappointed for a second
term, took up the thankless task at an especially black moment.
He was as brave as a lion ; and if his red beard gained him
the nickname of ' Rufus,' the Red Viceroy was as fearless as
though his life were absolutely secure, instead of depending
wholly on the vigilance of those surrounding him.
We all admired Lord Spencer for his firmness ; but this
was soon discovered to be due to the fact that he absolutely
followed the sage advice of Sir Edward Sullivan, the Lord
Chancellor, and after the death of the latter, Lord Spencer's
weakness was quite as remarkable as his previous firmness.
He was seen on one occasion with his hands pressing
his back.
LORD-LIEUTENANTS— CHIEF SECRETARIES 167
Said one man : —
' I fear his Excellency has lumbago.'
* Not at all,' replied his friend ; ' he is feeling for his
backbone.'
The state of Westmeath was reaUy the worst feature of
the period of his rule, yet Lord Spenser was in the country all
the while, and allowed matters to degenerate with his eyes
open.
He rode hard to hounds, in spite of countless threats,
and might have had a less uncomfortable time had the head
of the Constabulary been as thoroughly capable as his
subordinates,
Lord Carnarvon very nearly ruined the Government by
his communications with Mr. Parnell. He meant well, and
struck out a patriotic line of his own, which failed because it
was made in absolute ignorance of the Irish character. But he
never intended to involve his colleagues, although numbers of
people chose to regard him as a Tory Home Ruler. His
previous action in resigning the Secretaryship of the Colonies
in Lord Derby's third administration, owing to a difference
of opinion on parliamentary reform, and his subsequent
resignation because he disapproved of Lord Beaconsfield's
Eastern action in 1878, showed him to be a man of marked
and fearless opinions. Lord Salisbury ought to have known
that he was thrusting a brand into the fire when he sent him
to be the official bellows-blower of the Hibernian pot.
Lord Aberdeen will always be remembered as the husband
of his wife. Lady Aberdeen was a more ardent Home Ruler
than even her brother. Lord Tweedmouth. On one occasion
Lord Morris was next her at dinner, and she said she supposed
the majority of people in Ireland were in favour of Home
Rule.
1 68 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
' Indeed, then, with the exception of yourself and the
waiters, there 's not one in the room,' was his answer.
' Of course, not in the Castle,' she repHed with dignity ;
' but in your profession, and when you arc on circuit, surely
you must meet a good many ? '
' Occasionally — in the dock,' he drily retorted, after which
she discreetly dropped the subject.
Lord Aberdeen was most exemplary during his brief
tenure of office, and certainly it was not in his time that the
folk christened the royal box at the theatre the ' loose box,' in
allusion to the rather dubious English guests of the vivacious
viceroy.
Lord Londonderry and Lord Zetland may be both briefly
bracketed together as having done their duty admirably in
times less out of joint than those of their predecessors. Lord
Londonderry always drank Irish whisky himself, and recom-
mended it to his guests as a capital beverage — a thing which
the licensed victuallers did not mind mentioning to Paddy
and Mick when they were having a drop, despite their vaunted
contempt of all at * the Castle.'
No other Lord-Lieutenant ever had such a mournful
experience as Lord Houghton. Son of Monckton Milnes,
the ' cool of the evening,' he needed his father's temperament
to enable him to endure the boycott which Irish society
inflicted on him as the representative of the Home Rule
disruption policy. With no class did he go down, and
on a crowded market-day in Tralee not a hat was raised
to him.
One of his A.D.C.'s was subsequently on the veldt, and
when asked if it was not lonely, he replied : —
' Not more than Dublin Castle, when Houghton was the
king.'
LORD-LIEUTENANTS— CHIEF SECRETARIES 169
On one occasion some people were officially commanded
to dine. Not a carriage was to be seen as they drove up to
the Viceregal Lodge, so the gentleman told his coachman to
drive round the Phoenix Park, as they must be too early.
There was still no sign of any gathering as they again
approached the official residence, and when they entered they
found they were the only guests, and the infuriated Lord
Houghton, as well as all his household had been kept waiting
twenty minutes by this hapless pair.
Another story, which was much enjoyed in Ireland as
showing the pomposity of his Excellency, may be recalled.
Whether true it is now difficult to say, but there is no doubt
that the tale was started among the very house-party who were
at Carton at the time.
The beautiful chatelaine^ the lovely Duchess of Leinster,
was walking through the fields one Sunday afternoon with
Lord Houghton.
They came to a gate, which he opened, but to her astonish-
ment proceeded to walk through it first himself.
The indignant Duchess haughtily remarked : —
' The Prince of Wales would not think of passing through
a gate before me.'
' That may be ; but I represent the Queen,' replied Lord
Houghton, with unruffled imperturbability.
Lord Cadogan and Lord Dudley come so absolutely into
contemporary history that on them nothing can here be said,
except that their munificence has rendered it impossible for
any peer of moderate private means to hold the office.
In sober truth, however, the administration of Government
really rests with the Chief Secretary in recent times, although
it was not so before the advent of Mr. Foster. Men like
Lord Naas, Sir Robert Peel the younger, and Mr. Chichester
lyo REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Fortescue — afterwards Lord Carlingford — were mere official
cyphers, but after Mr. Gladstone's 1880 ministry this has
never been the case.
Of Sir Robert Peel it was wittily said that when Chief
Secretary he went through the country on an outside
car, which made him take a one-sided view of the Irish
question.
Lord Morris said to an inquiring Scottish M.P. : —
' Did you ever know a Scottish Secretary who was not
Scottish, or an Irish Secretary who was Irish ? '
' No,' said the Scotsman.
' Well, go home and moralise over that as a possible
solution of some Irish difficulties, for may be, if an Irishman
was sent over, by accident, to be Chief Secretary, the official
would not fall into the mistake of trying to reconcile the
irerconcilable.'
And to my mind Lord Morris had the last word in every
sense.
Mr. W. E. Forster was far too honest to be the tool of
Mr. Gladstone's Hibernian dishonesty. He was perfectly
fearless, but, beneath his rugged exterior, deeply sensitive.
He winced under ' buckshot,' and many other epithets ; but
abuse and danger alike never prevented him from doing what
he had to do to the best of his ability. His earliest acquaint-
ance with Ireland had been in the famine, when he was one of
the deputation of succour organised by the Society of Friends,
and everybody who has read Mr. Morley's Life of Cobden will
remember the appreciation of their efforts by the great free-
trader.
Mr. Forster did not think the Irish administration should
be all ' a scuffle and a scramble,' and he inaugurated a reversal
of the old balance between Lord- Lieutenants and Chief Secre-
LORD-LIEUTENANTS— CHIEF SECRETARIES 171
taries which has never been subsequently changed. Indeed, it
is often only the latter who has a seat in the Cabinet. He was
the victim of many misapprehensions — the bulk of them
wilful — but one which worried him was a widespread con-
viction that he was a slow man. His delivery was slow,
his manner deliberate, and he did not lightly give an opinion.
Yet emphatically he was not a slow man, and as an instance
may be stated the fact that he elaborated his scheme of
decentralising the powers of the Irish Government in a single
evening in December 1881. I know he was harassed, nay,
martyrised, beyond endurance, through the evasive volubility
of Mr. Gladstone, which, both by mouth and letter, formed a
heavier burden than all the Irish attacks ; but he was a just
and conscientious man, and I never heard of a case where
appeal was made to him on which he did not act as reasonably
as was compatible with loyalty to such a Prime Minister.
His courage in walking unarmed and without police escort
in Tulla and Athenry was as great as ever was displayed by a
knight-errant of old. The Nationalist papers, no longer able
to taunt him with cowardice, took to declaring him to be a
person notorious for ferocious brutality.
Sir Wemyss Reid said that in the House of Commons his
fellow-members had literally seen his hair whiten during those
two years of patriotic martyrdom in Ireland, and I always
feel that the inner life of this reticent, commanding statesman
would have made a wonderful human document. His capacity,
if not his forbearance, has been inherited by his adopted son,
Mr. Arnold Forster, the present Secretary for War, who acted
as his private secretary in the latter years of his life.
When I read Lord Rosebery's speech advocating a Cabinet
of business men, I instinctively thought of the late Mr. W. E.
Forster, and it is his heir who is the first illustration of the
172 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Liberal Peer's theory. Since Cromwell cleared out the House
of Commons, no one has done so much as Mr. Arnold Forster,
for he upset the seats of the mighty in the War Office three
months after he kissed hands. I wonder how he would have
dealt with Parnellism and crime.
Mr. Forster's predecessor, Mr. James Lowther, was an
uncommonly capable man, and gifted with a fund of humour
which prevented him from taking the Irish too seriously. In
1879 ^ heard the Irish members in the House of Commons
vituperating him after a manner that subsequently became
unpleasantly familiar, but was then regarded as a gross breach
of the conventions of debate. * Jim ' lay back on the Treasury
bench with his hat over his eyes, and to all appearance sound
asleep. Never once did he show sign of hearing their
verbal tornado ; but eventually he sprang to his feet, and. with
infectious gaiety literally chaffed them to madness. I have
often thought that the long-limbed Tory member for Hertford,
who was then private secretary to his uncle. Lord Salisbury,
must have taken note of the methods of Mr. Lowther in
dealing with the Irish party, for it was absolutely on the same
lines that he subsequently developed that superb flow of
sarcasm which made him, Mr. A. J. Balfour, the popular idol
ten years later.
It has been a practice for many years to appoint a man
Chief Secretary for Ireland in order to see if he is fit for
anything else. This plan turned out well in the case of Mr.
A. J. Balfour, for he knew Ireland better than any other
Chief Secretary, and when he came to know it properly he
was removed.
His brother did as much harm in Ireland as Mr. Arthur
Balfour did good. Indeed, in the whole nineteenth century
no other incompetent Chief Secretary misunderstood Ireland
LORD-LIEUTENANTS— CHIEF SECRETARIES 173
with such complete complacency, and if it had not been for
the supervision which ' A. J.' undoubtedly gave, Mr. Gerald
Balfour would have a still worse record.
There was a poem, not particularly brilliant, which may be
quoted because it is not widely known : —
' If I had a Balfour who wrong would go,
Do you think I 'd tolerate him ? — No, no, no !
I 'd give him coercion in Kilmainham jail.
And return him to Arthur, who 'd laugh at his wail.'
In fact the impression prevailed that Ireland was then
sacrificed to the nepotism of Lord Salisbury, who had inflicted
the least capable of the House of Cecil on the distressful
country.
When the Duke of York was in Ireland, he stayed with
Lord Dunraven, and Mr. Gerald Balfour as Chief Secretary
was one of the house-party, and the mother of the Knight of
Glin was also there.
A short time before, a chemist from Cork, who had been
appointed sub-confiscator, and desired to secure his own
position, had heavily cut down the Fitzgerald rents.
Mr. Balfour, by way of making polite conversation,
observed to Mrs. Fitzgerald : —
' I believe your son's property has been a long time in the
family.'
' Yes,' she said, * we got it in the reign of Edward 1., and
held it until last year, when the Government sent an apothecary
from Cork to rob us of it.'
The conversation dropped.
Mr. Arthur Balfour was very plucky, not only personally,
but in his legislative efforts, and he did wonders for Ireland —
the light railways relieving numbers from starvation, and
opening up the country.
174 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
An English journalist went down to the West, and tried to
make inquiries about the popularity of the Chief Secretary.
He came to the cabin of a man who had been rescued
from starvation by getting Government employment, and had
thrived so well that he had become possessed of a pig.
This pig, on the appearance of the Englishman, escaped
into a potato-field, and he heard the woman of the house shout
to her son : —
' Mickey, look sharp and turn out Arthur Balfour before
he does any mischief.'
The name of the pig showed the gratitude of the family.
When alluding to Mr. Lowther I omitted to mention that
he was always of opinion that a well-planned scheme of educa-
tion was the best panacea for the Irish troubles, and it certainly
would have brought up a generation less keenly sensitive to
the exaggerated wrongs of the country to which both sexes
are so frantically attached. During his not very lengthy
tenure of the office of Chief Secretary it was asserted that Sir
George Trevelyan also had some such idea ; but whether he
went so far as to draft his plan, and it was consigned to some
forgotten pigeon-hole by Mr. Gladstone, I cannot say.
When the Duke of Argyll described Sir George Trevelyan
as a jelly-fish, he made a comparison which, from my personal
experience, I should call particularly apt.
Ireland had very little use for such a flabby politician, and
it may be added, he had very little use for Ireland.
He was in such a devil of a fright at being forced to
succeed poor Lord Frederick Cavendish that it was some time
before the pressure put upon him sufficed to make him accept
office, nor would he be induced to go over to Dublin Castle
at all until he had been given Cabinet rank. As for the
Cabinet, they were so anxious to settle upon a living target for
LORD-LIEUTENANTS— CHIEF SECRETARIES 175
the Home Rulers to practise upon, and so afraid that through
his default one of themselves might have to undertake the
unpleasant office, that they would have given the prospective
victim almost anything he liked, on the principle of letting the
condemned criminal choose what he prefers for his final meal
before that brief interview with the hangman.
Directly after the formation of the following Radical
Government, I met an Englishman of considerable political
importance in Pall Mall, and he observed : —
* The new Cabinet is quarrelling among themselves.'
* Who are fighting ? ' I asked.
' Chamberlain and Trevelyan,' he replied.
' What about .? '
* Chamberlain says that he brought the party back into
office, and he wants the Colonial Office ; but Gladstone
insists on his being content with the Local Government
Board. Trevelyan says that, as he has for years had
experience in naval affairs, he ought to be made First Lord.
But Gladstone, though he cannot prevail on him to be Chief
Secretary, has sent him to the India Office.'
* And may give him free lodgings in Kilmainham if he is
refractory,' I chimed in. * And so these two are like pigs
with their bristles hurt, poor things. There 's a pity.'
Some time later, when I heard Messrs. Chamberlain and
Trevelyan were so disgusted with the Home Rule Bill that
they were leaving the Government, says I to myself, * I wonder
if Mr. Gladstone in his own heart thinks if he had gratified
their wishes about office he could have retained them.'
But as a matter of fact both are patriots far above such
demeaning insinuations.
Mr. John Morley was a very well-meaning Chief Secretary,
but a very misguided man.
176 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
In a conversation with me, Mr. Morley observed that,
owing to the agitation, he saw no alternative but to make
Parnell Chief Secretary.
I said that would be no use, for if he attempted to do his
duty he would be shot, even more readily than I should.
Mr. Morley retorted : —
' He is the leader of the Irish nation.'
' I admit it,' I replied, ' and he is the only man you can
make terms with.'
' How ^ ' says he.
* You had better ask him,' says I, ' to nominate some
foreign potentate to appoint commissioners who will say to
Mr. Parnell, " Let Ireland pay her share of the national debt
and buy out every loyal person who wishes to leave the
country," and then, if Mr. Parnell says, " We are not able to
do that," let them retort, "We will then disfranchise you,
for this humbug has been going on long enough." '
'That's about it, according to your lights,' replied Mr.
Morley.
Was I not right ^
It is a singular fact that Ulster and Alsace-Lorraine have
about the same acreage — 5,322,334 to 3,586,560 — and about
the same population — 1,581,357 to 1,719,470. The French
and Germans are each willing to spend a hundred millions of
money and half a million lives, the one to recover, the other
to retain, the province, and yet Mr. Gladstone proposed, not
only to abandon Ulster, but to put it under the rule of the
people the Ulsterites hate most on earth.
It is also remarkable that at the time of the Union the
population of Belfast was 35,000, and Dublin 250,000. Now
Belfast is 335,000, while Dublin remains at a quarter of a
million. Belfast, in point of customs, is the third largest city
LORD-LIEUTENANTS— CHIEF SECRETARIES 177
in the British dominions, coming next after London and
Liverpool, whilst it is the finest shipbuilding town in the world.
Yet its inhabitants were to be sold as though they were
African slaves, for the sole purpose of getting votes for the
Liberal Government.
I was one day invited by Froude to come to his home
to argue out the Irish question with Mr. Jacob Bright and
Mr. John Morley.
I counted on having Mr. Froude on my side, knowing his
strong views, but as host he would not interfere. However,
Miss Cobbe was there, and to my mind was equal to any of
the company. With her on my side, I flatter myself we were
too many for the others ; but the worst of all arguments is
that the arguing rarely serves any purpose except to make
either party more obstinate.
I knew John Bright very well.
He was far and away the most honest man of all the
Liberal party, and he fully realised the fact that a visible
concentration of property and universal suffrage could not
exist together. He was therefore anxious to enlarge the
number of proprietors, but he did not countenance it being
done entirely at the expense of the English Government
without the tenants having to find such a sum of money out
of their own pockets as would give them an interest in
paying off the Government charges.
He was a very broad-minded man, with a simplicity of
character which was admirable. I liked him much, and my
one complaint against him was that he would never accept
my invitations to come and pay me a visit in Kerry.
I never heard him make a speech, but with his beautiful voice
it was a great treat to hear him read Milton. On one occasion
he took me to the House specially to see Mr. Gladstone, but
M
1 78 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
after nearly an hour he had reluctantly to tell me that the
Prime Minister could not find leisure for our conversation
that day owing to pressure of business, and another opportunity
never came.
Although I regret not having met Mr. Gladstone, I yet
feel glad that I never shook him by the hand, I may here
mention that I never met Mr. Parnell, though I have seen him
in the House.
From my point of view Mr, John Morley has a dual
existence. As man and as historian he is Jekyl, but as
politician he is Hyde.
There is a well-known story about him, so familiar to some
of us that it is possibly forgotten in England, wherefore I
venture to relate it once more.
He was on a car, and asked the driver : —
' Well, Pat, you '11 be having great times when you get
Home Rule ^ '
' We will, your honour — for a week,' replied the man.
' Why only a week .'' ' inquired the politician.
* Driving the quality to the steamers.'
CHAPTER XVI
GLADSTONIAN LEGISLATION
Although the exact measure of my appreciation of the Irish
policy of the most dangerous Englishman of the nineteenth
century has already been clearly indicated by casual remarks
in previous chapters, that will not absolve me from duly
setting forth some sketch of the inestimable amount of evil
which resulted from the interest he unfortunately took in
my unhappy land.
If Napoleon was the scourge of Europe, Mr. Gladstone
was the most malevolent imp of mischief that ever ruined
any one country, and I am heartily grieved that that country
should have been mine.
It is so difficult to get English people to take any interest
in Irish topics that I fully expect this chapter will be skipped
by most of my readers east of Dublin. Yet if any will read
these few pages, they will get as clear a view of the harm
one man can do a whole land as by wading through hundreds
of volumes, for I am giving them the concentrated knowledge
I have accumulated by years devoted to profound study of the
subject.
The course of history may be taken up almost on the
morrow of the famine, for potatoes began to be a scarce
crop again in 1850, yet the country was improving rapidly,
and the relations between landlord and tenant were as cordial
as in any part of the world.
179
i8o REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
So they continued in absolute amity until what is virtually
universal suffrage was introduced and the ignoramus became
the tool of every political knave.
Mr. Gladstone stated that he brought in the Irish Church
Act to pacify the country in 1868, when the land was as
peaceful as English pastures on a Sunday evening. He must
really have done so to propitiate English dissenters, for no one
in Ireland appeared to want it.
By this Act a resident gentleman was taken away from
every parish in Ireland, whereby the evils of absentee land-
lordism were gravely enhanced.
Mr. Gladstone called it an act of sublime justice from
England to Ireland. Previously, in virtue of ancient treaties
commencing as far back as the reigns of William and Mary,
the English Government was giving Presbyterians a grant
— called Regium Donum — of ^^70,000 a year, and by a more
recent arrangement was giving Maynooth a grant of ;^24,ooo,
but that Whig Government actually paid them off out of the
spoils of the Irish Church, thereby saving the British Exchequer
j{| 94,000 a year.
And if this be an act of justice, then Aristides can be
classed among hypocritical swindlers.
It must be borne in mind that when William Pitt caused
the Act of Union to be passed in Parliament, the union of
the Churches was a fundamental feature, and this, indeed,
was the main inducement held out to Protestants to promote
the Union.
Surely it cannot be held to be a valid Union when the
principal consideration in it is set aside, to say nothing of
increasing the taxation by two million sterling a year more
than was ever contemplated by the Act. This was clearly
borne out by a Royal Commission composed mostly of
GLADSTONIAN LEGISLATION i8i
Englishmen and presided over by Mr. Childers, an earnest
politician and an ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer.
The Catholic priests who expected that their Church would
be established were disappointed, while the landlords, who were
generally Protestants, had henceforth to support their clergy
and at the same time to pay tithes to the State.
As Irish taxation increased 50 per cent, while that of
England only increased 18 per cent,, the Irish people did not
find Mr. Gladstone's Act soothing or profitable.
His next perpetration was the Land Act of 1870, whereby
he provided that no landlord could turn out his tenant without
paying him for all his improvements (even if these had been
done without the knowledge or sanction of the landlord) and
giving the tenant a compensation in money equal to about
one-fourth of the fee-simple.
This Act might have been all right in principle, but it
was useless in practice, and the compensation made to the
County Court Judge for adjudicature came to far more than
the amount awarded.
This is easily accounted for, thus : —
You might as well bring in an Act of Parliament to prevent
people cutting off their own noses.
No sane person does such a thing, and no landlord ever
turned out an improving tenant.
But the Irish tenants, having almost the sole representation
of the country in their hands, returned a body of representa-
tives pledged to the confiscation of landed property ; and in
order to keep his party in power by securing their votes,
Mr. Gladstone brought in the Land Act of 1 8 8 1 .
I heard him introduce the motion in the House of
Commons, and his speech was a truly marvellous feat of
oratory. He was interrupted on all sides of the House, and
i82 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
In a speech of nearly five hours in length never once lost the
thread of his discourse.
As far as I could judge, he never even by accident let slip
one word of truth.
When the Act passed, Mr. Gladstone anticipated that
eight sub-commissioners would do the work. This number
very soon ran up to one hundred sub-commissioners and
more than twenty County Court valuers.
The result is that every tenant has been running down his
land and letting it go out of cultivation, for the tenants know
the commissioners value the ground as they find it, and a
premium is thus, of course, put on neglecting the soil.
To show the system on which the valuation was done,
many cases have been known of the commissioners arriving
to value a property after three o'clock on a December
afternoon.
It is a positive fact that there are professional experts who
obtain substantial fees for showing tenants the speediest
methods of damaging their own land.
All the same I cannot help thinking their services are
a matter of supererogation, for a recalcitrant Irish tenant
in the South and West needs instruction in no branch of
villainy.
On one of Lord Kenmare's estates, I executed drainage
works costing over £100. These were dependent upon
sluices to keep out the tide at high water. A few days
before the land was to be inspected, the tenants put bushes
in the sluices, let the tide in and flooded the whole land.
And then a prating, mendacious local schoolmaster began
comparing these villains to the patriotic Dutch who flooded
their land rather than permit it to be conquered by the
national foe.
GLADSTONIAN LEGISLATION 183
I could give scores of such instances of wilful destruction
of property for the purpose of obtaining a reduction.
Here is one.
A tenant near Blarney, in County Cork, was seen to be
ploughing up a valuable water meadow.
When asked by a gentleman why he was injuring his land,
he replied without hesitation that he was going to get his rent
fixed, and immediately afterwards he should lay it down again
as a water meadow.
It is scarcely credible how great was the amount of
perjury that this Act brought into the country.
A tenant on a property to which I was agent, whose rent
was ;^6 a year, swore he expended ^^395 on improvements and
all that it was worth afterwards was ^4, los. He received
the implicit credit of the court.
According to the laws of the Roman Catholic Church
perjury in a court of justice is a reserved sin for which
absolution can only be given by a bishop or by priests
specially appointed for that purpose.
One priest applied to the bishop for plenary powers, and
said the bishop to him : —
' Are the people so generally bad in your parish ? '
' It 's the fault of the laws, my lord,' replied the
priest.
' What laws ^ ' asked the bishop.
' Firstly, under the Crimes Act, my poor people have to
swear they do not know the moonlighters that come to the
house, or they would be murdered.
' Secondly, under the Arrears Act, they have to swear they
are worth nothing in the world or they would not get the
Government money.
* Thirdly, under the Land Act, while they have to swear
1 84 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
up their own improvements, they must also swear down the
value of the land, or they will get no reductions.
' So you see, my lord, the sin lies at the door of those
who made the infamous laws which lead weak sinners into
temptation they cannot be expected to overcome.'
The bishop said nothing, but he gave the priest all the
powers he desired.
I myself heard this story from a parish priest who was
present, and as I hav^e several times told it to different people,
it may have found its way into print, though I have no
recollection of ever seeing it in black and white.
Allusion having just been made to the Arrears Act, it may
be here opportune to point out that this was the next step
in Mr. Gladstone's long sequence of Irish mismanagement.
This iniquitous measure provided that no matter how great
the arrears owed by the tenant, by lodging one year's rent
another could be obtained from the Government, and the land-
lord was compelled to wipe out the balance. So that if Jack,
Tom, and James were all tenants on town land, should Jack be
an honest man he obtained no redress, whereas if Tom and
James were hardened defaulters they obtained the complete
settlement of all their arrears.
To obtain the grant of a year's rent from Government,
the tenant had to swear as to his assets and also as to the
selling value of his farm.
Here is an illustration which came under my own
observation.
A tenant named Richard Sweeney, whose rent was ^48
a year, owed three years' rent. He paid one year, the Govern-
ment provided another, and the landlord had to forgive the
third.
To obtain this result, Sweeney swore that the selling
GLADSTONIAN LEGISLATION 185
value of his farm was nil, and he received a receipt in
full.
A few weeks later he served me — as agent for the landlord
— with notice that he had sold his interest in the property
for £630.
That is not the end of my story.
The purchaser was a man named Murphy, and a very
few years afterwards, upon the ground that the rent was
too dear, he took the farm for which he had paid ^^630
to Sweeney into the Land Courts and got the rent reduced
The absurdity of this system was well brought out before
the Fry Commission, when one high-commissioner and a sub-
commissioner both said that in valuing the land they took
into consideration the tenant's occupation interest.
The reader will see the way this works out, if he will
accept the very simple hypothetical case of two tenants holding
land to the worth of £^0 each, and one of them only
paying £^o a year rent. When they both took their cases
into the Land Court, the man paying the lower rent of
;^20 would obtain the larger reduction, because he had the
greater occupation.
These facts will show that a Purchase Bill was an absolute
necessity. Lord DufFerin truly remarked that landlord and
tenant were both in the same bed, and Mr. Gladstone thought
to settle their disputes by giving the tenant a larger share than
he had ever had before. But the tenant considered that as he
had obtained that concession by fraud and violence, if he could
only give one effective kick more, he would put the landlord
on the floor for the rest of the term of their national life.
When introducing the Land Act of 1870, Mr. Gladstone
proved himself if not an Irish statesman, an admirable prophet,
1 86 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
for he denounced in anticipation exactly what the effect of the
Land Act of 1 8 8 1 would be.
In 1 8 70, he prospectively criticised such an institution
as the Land Court, which in 1881 he proposed, with its power
to give a 'judicial rent.'
* But it is suggested we should establish, permanently and
positively, a power in the hands of the State to reduce
excessive rents. Now I should like to hear a careful argu-
ment in support of that plan. I wish at all events to retain
at all times a judicial habit of not condemning a thing utterly
until I have heard what is to be said for it ; but I own I
have not heard, I do not know, and I cannot conceive, what
is to be said for the prospective power to reduce excessive
rents. If I could conceive a plan more calculated than every-
thing else, first of all, for throwing into confusion the whole
economical arrangements of the country ; secondly, for driving
out of the field all solvent and honest men who might be
bidders for farms ; thirdly, for carrying widespread demoral-
isation throughout the whole mass of the Irish people, I must
say it is this plan.'
And again : —
' We are not ready to accede to a principle of legislation
by which the State shall take into its own hands the valuation
of rent throughout Ireland. I say, " take into its own hands "
because it is perfectly immaterial whether the thing shall be
done by a State officer forming part of the Civil Service, or
by an arbitration acting under State authority, or by any
other person invested by the law with power to determine
on what terms as to rent every holding in Ireland shall be
held.'
This categorical denunciation of the principle which he
was then asked, and which he peremptorily refused to sanction,
GLADSTONIAN LEGISLATION 187
was not enough for Mr, Gladstone, for the records of debate
show he went farther, but enough has been cited to show that
never was prophecy more fully fulfilled. Outrage followed
outrage with a rapidity unequalled in Europe, and that in a
country which previous to his remedial measures had practi-
cally been unstained by an agrarian outrage for fifty years.
It would certainly be both remiss of me, and altogether
below the character which I trust I have acquired for honest
plain speaking, if I omitted to give my views upon Mr,
Wyndham's Act, for those readers who regard my book as
something more than a storehouse of anecdotes — and since
it is written at all, I maintain it claims to be more than that —
having noticed the freedom with which I have spoken of
previous English legislation for Ireland, may very naturally
think I should be begging the question of the hour, if I
did not offer a few observations on the latest development of
the Irish question,
I must emphatically repeat what I have already asserted : —
that the Acts of Mr, Gladstone rendered a Purchase Bill
inevitable, and it fell to Mr. Wyndham's lot to formulate
the scheme which has now become law.
Mr. Wyndham's Act is a great one for Ireland, because
where a tenant previously paid ^^loo a year rent, all he will
have to pay — even at twenty-four years' purchase — is ^^80
a year, and at that rate with the bonus the landlord obtains
twenty-seven years' purchase. But this scale is a little halcyon
in most instances.
It should prove a boon to the country, and it is the
necessary outcome of the Land Act of 1881, by which rents
were cut down by commissioners, whose means of living
depended on the reductions they made.
And to make this state of things yet more remarkable,
1 88 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
there were two courts established for fixing rates. The one
consisted of sub-commissioners, who were paid by the year,
and the other was that of the County Court judge, who was
wholly dependent on a valuer paid by the day.
So, whoever cut down the most earned the most.
A valuer in Limerick was remonstrated with for cutting
down local rents so low, and he replied : —
' It is all for the good of trade, for it will bring every
tenant into the Court.'
And so it actually did, for that Court very shortly after-
wards was chock full of cases.
My own opinion is that the Wyndham Act would have
been far more beneficial, if the Government had given the
tenant a free grant of some of the purchase money, and insisted
on his finding some more of it himself, whereby would have
been created a deeper interest in his land than is now inspired
in his breast by the mere transference of his lease from his
old landlord to the Government.
I made this remark to an Englishman at the Carlton
Club, and he said to me that, according to his view, England
should lend whatever money was wanted but give no free
grant.
I replied : —
' A poor man from Kerry came to my house in London,
and asked for the loan of a pound. I declined to lend him
the sovereign, but I did lend him half a crown, and as he
bolted to America the very next day, I think I had the best of
the bargain.'
My friend accepted the analogy and dropped the subject.
That was far more tactful on his part than the conduct
of the English Government, for the different Acts of Parlia-
ment relating to Ireland have had the effect of rendering the
GLADSTONIAN LEGISLATION 189
feelings between landlord and tenant much worse than they
were before.
And the Act of 1 881, which provided that landlord and
tenant should have a lawsuit every fifteen years, brought the
feeling up to boiling pitch.
Now the Government inherits all this hatred by proposing
to be the sole landlord in Ireland. Therefore, England is
reaping the whirlwind where Mr. Gladstone sowed the wind.
This does not appear to me to be sound statesmanship.
An open hatred of the Government has been instilled into
the brain of thousands of Irish children side by side with
a more hypocritical hatred of the landlord. Now that these
two are to be combined in one passion, and that directed
against the receiver of rent, matters do not present a promising
outlook.
If the Government sell up those tenants who do not pay
rent in years to come, no Irish occupiers of the property will
be obtainable.
If English tenants be imported, the latter had better
insist on coats of mail for themselves, and on life insurance
policies in favour of the nearest relatives they leave behind in
England.
That reminds me of a story.
Sir Denis Fitzpatrick and his daughter were making a tour
of the Kerry fjords some years ago, and the lady asked a
boatman on Caragh Lake, what would happen to a tenant
who took an evicted farm.
The reply was : —
' I don't think he 'd do it again, Miss, leastways it 's in
the next world alone he 'd have the chance of making such a
fool of himself.'
This may be commended to any unsophisticated English
I90 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
who contemplate Hibernian immigration as a prospective
way of cheaply obtaining that once popular bait of Mr. Jesse
Collins, three acres and a cow.
Here is another aspect of not paying rent to Government,
which would occur to no one unacquainted with Ireland, but
is quite characteristic : —
Suppose twenty men were tenants on a townland ; one
would pay, and the other nineteen after being evicted would
also squat down on his patch. Unless caretakers at a cost
of about three times the rent were put in under excessive
police protection, all the nineteen farms would promptly
become derelict.
It would have been far better if the Government had
given a free grant of one quarter of the purchase money, had
compelled the tenant to himself find another quarter, and had
lent the remaining half for a comparatively short term, say
twenty-five years.
Then the tenant would have had genuine interest in the
redemption of his own property.
But, asks the English tourist impressed by the apparent
beggarliness of all he sees, how could the tenant procure a
quarter of the money ?
Naturally it would be alleged by the agitators that he
could not. All the same you may confidently contradict any
such denial as that.
It is clear that almost any tenant could get the money, if
you bear in mind that though rents are so reduced, the most
unimproving tenant can get from ten to twenty years' purchase
for the good-will of his farm.
Of course, just now the old order is changing considerably
in Ireland, but the loss of their old landlords is not appreciated
by the better class of tenants, though the good have of course
GLADSTONIAN LEGISLATION 191
to suffer for the bad — a thing even better known in my country
than elsewhere. I heard an interesting confirmation of this
from a lady of my acquaintance, who having asked a respectable
woman what had become of her son, received the reply : —
' Ah, for sure, he has got a situation with a farmer.'
' Well, that 's a good start in life, is it not ^ ' asked my
friend, to which the woman retorted in melancholy accents : —
* That may be, but my family have always been rared
(i.e. reared) on the gentry until now,' thereby expressing a
feeling very prevalent in Ireland to-day.
The Home Rulers allege that these high prices which are
paid for the good-will of land are attributable to two causes : —
(a) Excess of competition for land.
(^) Irish returning from America.
Both these reasons are absurd.
When the population of Ireland was nearly eight millions,
these prices could not be obtainable, nor anything like them,
while to-day the population is only four millions. Unless the
returning emigrants thought they were obtaining good value
for their money, they would hardly abandon a country — the
United States — where they can get land for nothing.
The enormous increase in the Irish Savings Banks, as well
as the deposits in other Irish Banks, must be almost entirely
derived from the savings of the farmers. The landlords have
been ruined by the Land Act ; labourers have no money to
spare ; and traders will not leave their money idle at the small
rate of interest credited.
If the farmers thought they had better means of using the
money, they would withdraw it, and they are without doubt as
well aware as I am how they can do the English Government
in the future, for if there is any roguery unknown to them, it
is infinitesimal.
192 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
I cannot say that I think many landlords will leave Ireland
in consequence of the Wyndham Act. The few who will go
are those who are glad to be quit at any price, and to be free
to pack out of the country. But many a landlord will be far
more comfortable on his own estate, when he has rid himself
of all his tenants.
One feature of this curious Act is that the Geraldines
have got rid of the last of their property, and escaped all the
forfeitures.
As for the sporting rights, far too much fuss has been
made over them. Except where there are plantations or good
fishing, they are of very little value one way or the other.
The Act will not affect the hunting. Small Irish farmers
like to see the hunt almost as much as the hunting set them-
selves like to participate in it.
Of course, too, the Act ought to be popular in Ireland,
because it is taking so much money out of England,
A point I wish to emphasise is one about which there has
been a great deal of misconception.
A considerable amount of capital has been made out of
the depreciation of agricultural produce in Ireland as compared
with England. But Ireland is a stock-producing country and
not an agricultural country in the strict sense, for the cultiva-
tion of wheat in Ireland has long since ceased to exist. The
true relation may be seen in the fact that in England the
difficulty of getting store-cattle was a loss to farmers, whereas
it has been a decided gain to farmers in Ireland — though they
are not best pleased when you impress the fact on them.
Mr. Finlay Dun in Landlords and 'Tenants in Ireland in
1 88 1 cites some examples which may be apt to-day when we
are considering Mr. Wyndham's Act.
He writes on page 64 : —
GLADSTONIAN LEGISLATION 193
' Kilcockan parish between Lismore and Youghal was in
great part disposed of in the Landed Estates Court thirty
years ago. It was bought, some of it by occupiers, some of
it by shopkeepers and attorneys. Rents have been raised,
and there is not much appearance of prosperity. Newtown,
for several generations the fee-simple property of a family of
the name of Nason, after the famine of 1846, was cut up and
sold ; the family residence is in ruin. At Lower Curry glass,
a few miles east of Lismore, a good farm of five hundred acres,
belonging to a family who have been obliged to leave it, bears
sad evidence of neglect ; the good old deserted manor-house,
the farm buildings, and a dozen cottages in the village are
falling to pieces. Contrary to what might be anticipated,
some of the smaller proprietors in this district have been
strenuous supporters of the Land League, although it is to be
hoped that they repudiate the destruction of the cattle on the
land of Mr. Grant, which were stabbed, and some of them
drowned in the river. Mr. Grant had come under the ban
of the League for evicting a dissipated bankrupt tenant, whose
debts to the extent of two hundred pounds he had paid, and
who would have been reinstated, if there had been the remotest
prospect of reformed habits or of getting clear of his diffi-
culties. Such acts appear to justify the statement, " that
Irishmen don't know what they want, and won't be satisfied
until they get it." '
God knows we have waded knee deep in blood of men,
and domestic animals since that was written, yet to-day are
we any nearer the final solution of the Irish difficulties ^ In
my opinion, certainly not.
N
CHAPTER XVII
THE STATE OF KERRY
It has been stated that it is only within the last forty years
that the bulk of the people of Ireland, long outside the pale of
the ballot-box, have actively entered political life. This is
quite true.
The whole of the Home Rule troubles followed the pre-
sentation of practically universal suffrage to the half-educated
and over-enthusiastic Irish, who are easily led away, apt to
believe mob-orators, and, by inherited instinct, to go against
the Government.
What the effect of universal suffrage in India would be it
is not my business to estimate. Still, the analogy of what the
ballot-paper provided in Ireland, if applied to the teeming
population of our Oriental Empire, suggests a pandemonium
to which the horrors of the Mutiny are but a mere scream
of agony.
The ballot transformed Ireland; or rather, it permitted
the worst passions of the most ignorant to be played upon
by interested adventurers, when the political power of Ireland
had passed for ever out of the hands of the restraining
classes. Democracy spelt anarchy, and the word patriotism
was degraded in a way that had no parallel since the French
Revolution.
The first outward and visible sign was the creation of the
Irish Home Rule party, which constituted itself separate and
194
THE STATE OF KERRY 195
distinct from the rest of the House of Commons, the standard
of which the new gang was to debase. Nor did they rest
content until it became the scene of faction fights and organ-
ised obstruction in combination with the flagrant violation of
all decencies of language and behaviour.
Members were returned for Irish constituencies who had
been convicts ; others came who richly deserved imprisonment
for life. They instigated murders, and clamoured because the
murderers were not regarded as heroes ; or if they were hung,
canonised them as martyrs. They attempted to prostitute the
law to their own base standard of political morality. They
assiduously laboured to render life valueless in Ireland and
property worthless, whilst no deed was too cowardly, no
atrocity too barbarous, for them to praise. They alone in
modern times warred against women and children. Animals
were the dumb victims of the inhuman ferocity they in no
way tried to check, and they effectively taught the receptive
Irish millions that a British Government could be coerced into
giving what was demanded provided a sufficient number of
crimes created a holocaust large enough to intimidate the
weak-kneed at St. Stephen's.
But Mr. Parnell and the Land League would all have
been promptly reduced to the pitiful unimportance from
which they had so noisily emerged if it had not been for
Mr. Gladstone.
The root of English politics has been party government —
' where all are for a party, and none are for the State,' to
reverse Macaulay's famous line. Now the Irish vote of sixty
was a solid asset, capable in many cases of weighing down one
side of the political scale. It was obvious that the votes would
be unscrupulously given, and Mr. Gladstone bid higher than
the Tories. Literally the necessary parliamentary machinery
196 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
for the government of the United Kingdom was clogged by
the Nationalists, who brought obstruction to a fine art, and
it was Mr. Gladstone who always gave in when the Irish
outcry would have stimulated an honest man to avail
himself of all loyal forces which law and the common weal
provided.
Long before this the Irish political agitator had set himself
to embitter the relations existing between landlord and tenant.
An Englishman goes into Parliament for various motives ;
an Irishman for his living. If he did not outshout his neigh-
bour, if he were not implicitly obedient to Mr. Parnell, if he
did not arouse the worst passions of the worst people in his
constituency, he was promptly dismissed.
To do them justice, the Irish members gave such an
exhibition of blackguardism as has no parallel on earth, though
it earned but the mildest rebuke from their obsequious ally,
Mr. Gladstone.
In 1869, for example, before this balloting away of all
that was creditable to Ireland, the relations between landlord
and tenant were of the most kindly nature. The leading
landlords of Kerry generally represented the county in Par-
liament with uniform decency and occasional brilliance, while
larger sums were borrowed and expended by the landlords
under the Land Improvement Act than were spent in the
same way in any other county. I can prove that the principal
landowner in Kerry — Lord Kenmare — expended a greater sum
in ten years on his estates than he received out of them,
though I cannot say he ever found out for himself that it was
better to give than to receive.
For fifty years prior to what Mr. Gladstone was pleased to
call his ' remedial legislation,' Kerry was unstained by agrarian
crime ; all things went on smoothly, and a number of railways
THE STATE OF KERRY 197
were constructed with guaranteed capital, half of which was
contributed by the landlords, although they received no benefit
from the increased prices of farm produce caused by railway
communication. The Board of Works returns show that the
money borrowed by Kerry landlords under the different Land
Improvement Acts amounted to almost half a million, and yet
the deductions made under the Land Act were greater in
Kerry than in other counties.
Here is an instance from my own experience.
I purchased from the Government in 1879 an estate, the
rental of which was ^^517, 2s. ^d.; it was considered so
cheaply let that the majority of the tenants offered twenty-
seven years' purchase for their farms. I borrowed from the
Government and expended on drainage ;^ii2o, 14s. iid.
Then the Commissioners under the Land Act reduced the
rental to ;^495, los. 6d., and the Government which sold me
the estate continued to compel me to pay interest on the
amount borrowed, although by its own legislation I was deprived
of any advantage resulting from the outlay.
The rental of Kerry in 1870 was considerably less than it
had been forty years previously, and higher prices were paid
for the fee-simple of land than were offered in any other part
of Ireland. But Mr. Gladstone's ' remedial manoeuvres '
changed the country and the people.
Demoralising bribes to the Irish nation frittered away the
proceeds of the plunder of the Irish Church. A notable
instance was a million under the Arrears Act, the principle
of which was that no honest tenant who had paid his rent
could derive any benefit from it, but that any drunkard or
squanderer who had not paid his rent might have it paid for
him by the Government on swearing that he was unable
to pay.
198 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Here is an instance that occurred on an estate under my
management.
A tenant, whose yearly rent was ^48, had one year's rent
paid by Government and another year's rent given up by his
landlord, on his swearing that the selling value of his farm
was nil\ ten weeks afterwards he served me with a notice, as
required by the statute, that he had sold the interest of the
farm for £6']o.
Again, there was a tenant who swore that he had expended
^^513, 14s. 6d. in permanent improvements, and that after
this expenditure the fair letting value of the farm was only
;^I7, though the original rent was £16^ 4s.
How could I blame an ignorant peasantry for making
false statements, when laws were framed by the leaders of
public opinion in England which released the Irish tenants
from every moral obligation, and made their assumed responsi-
bilities and agreements a dead letter ; while orators, living on
the wages of patriotism, were allowed to preach sedition and
plunder to an excitable people ? The result was that the work
of demoralisation made rapid progress, perjury became a joke,
assassination was merely ' removal,' and men who had been
brutally murdered were said to have met with an accident,
I have already shown how apt a prophet Mr. Gladstone
was in his forecast in the House of Commons in 1870, and
one more quotation adds testimony to his inspiration — though
from what direction it came I will not linger to inquire : —
* Compulsory valuation and fixity of tenure would bring
about total demoralisation and a Saturnalia of crime.'
Exactly.
Mr. Laing, formerly M.P. for Orkney, in a magazine
article defended the ' Plan of Campaign ' as an innocent
attempt to defend the weak against the strong, and as having
THE STATE OF KERRY 199
been adopted only on estates where rents were too high, in
fact, as the result of high rents. As a matter of fact, in
Orkney the rents advanced 1 94 per cent., and during the same
period in Kerry they dwindled. He also asserted that the Irish
tenants' improvements had been confiscated by the landlords as
the tenant improved.
Certainly the law did not prevent them increasing the
rent ; but, unfortunately for the reasoning of Mr. Laing, and
his taking for granted imaginary ' confiscations,' figures most
decidedly prove that the landlords did not use any such power.
The rentals have steadily decreased while the landlords were
borrowing and expending nearly half a million in my own
county.
This fact is conclusively demonstrated by the Government
returns.
As to the National League — with all its paraphernalia of
boycotting, shooting from behind a hedge, merciless beating,
shooting in the legs, and other similar variations of Irish
Home Rule, on which I shall dwell in a later chapter — being
only a protector of the weak tenant against the hard landlord,
I think one fact will prove more forcibly than any argument
the fallacy of such an assertion.
There were two estates in Kerry let at a much lower rate
than any others in the county — those of Lord Cork and Colonel
Oliver.
Colonel Oliver's agent was the only one fired at in Kerry
in 1886, and Lord Cork's agent was the only one obliged to
employ over two hundred police to protect him in endeavouring
to recover in 1887 rent which was due in 1884. This rent
was due on land let at considerably under the Poor Law
valuation, and the rents were only half what was paid in i860.
These cases afford a decided proof that the Land or
200 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
National League carries on its government irrespective of
high or low rents, and the ' Plan of Campaign ' is worked
according as the local branches of the League have disciplined
or terrorised the inhabitants of a district, the orders from
'headquarters' depending on the probability of success.
I should like to retort on Mr. Laing that, while the
evidence before the Land Commissioner proved the rental
of Ireland was diminishing, that of the country where his own
property lay increased to an unusual degree. I do not say the
landlords confiscated the tenants' improvements, possibly they
made none. But figures are hard facts, and they prove three
things : —
First, that Kerry landlords spent ^^453, 539 on improve-
ments. Secondly, that the rental of Kerry was lower in 1880
than in 1840. Thirdly, that the rental of Orkney increased
194 per cent, during that time.
On the south-west coast of Kerry lie the Blasquets, a
group of islands the property of Lord Cork, one of them
inhabited by some twenty-five families. The old rental was
_^8o, which was regularly paid. This was reduced by Lord
Cork to ;^40, the Government valuation being £60. Now
this island reared about forty milch cows, besides young cattle
and sheep, and at the period when might meant right in
Ireland the inhabitants, having some surplus stock, took
possession of another island to feed them on.
This island was let to another man, but he was not able to
resist the tenants any more than the mouse nibbling a piece
of cheese is able to fight a cat.
For ten years up to 1887 those tenants paid no poor rate.
They successfully resisted the payment of county cess, to the
detnment of their fellow taxpayers, and they only paid one
half year's rent out of six, and that not until they had been
THE STATE OF KERRY 201
served with writs. And these people, in the year 1886, sent
a memorial to the Government to save them from starvation.
This is a remarkable case, and proves that poverty and the
cry of starvation are not always the result of rents and taxes,
as the Irish patriots and their English separatist allies so
frequently assert.
I am going to quote a colloquy overheard at a Kerry
fair to show how deeply the teaching of Messrs. Parnell,
Gladstone, Dillon, Morley, Davitt, Biggar, and Company has
taken root in the Irish mind.
Jim from Castleisland meeting Mick from Glenbeigh,
asks : —
' Well, Mick, an' how are ye getting on ? '
' lUigant, glory be to the Saints.'
' How 's that, Mick ? Sure, prices is low.'
' True for you, Jim, prices is low ; but what we has we
haSf for we pays nobody.'
And to that I will add another observation.
Somebody asked me : —
' If Ireland were to get Home Rule, what would become
of the agitator } '
I replied : —
* He would be called a reformer, unless it paid him better
to clamour for a fresh Union. He 'd sell all his patriotism
for five shillings, and his loyalty could be bought by a few
glasses of whisky.'
And that 's the whole truth of the matter.
CHAPTER XVIII
A GLANCE AT MY STEWARDSHIP
Davitt called the generation after O'Connell's ' a soulless age
of pitiable cowardice.'
I should call the generation that was active in the early-
eighties 'a cowardly age of pitiless brutality.'
Times had begun to mend in Ireland from 1850, and had
continued to do so until the ballot made the country a prey to
self-seeking political agitators.
Mr. Gladstone considered that if you gave a scoundrel
a vote it made him into a philanthropist, whereas events
proved it made him an eager accessory of murder, outrage,
and every other crime.
Yet this happened after Fenianism had practically died out
in the early seventies.
I myself heard Mr. Gladstone say that landlords had been
weighed in the balance and had not been found wanting, for
the bad ones were exceptional.
None the less were they and their representatives delivered
over to their natural opponents, who were egged on by the
Land League and by its tacit or active supporters in the
House of Commons.
Emphatically I repeat the assertion that neither Mr. Parnell
nor the Land League would have been formidable without the
active help of Mr. Gladstone.
Before 1870 Kerry used to be represented by gentlemen
202
A GLANCE AT MY STEWARDSHIP 203
of the county. The present members in 1904 are an
attorney's clerk, an assistant schoolmaster, a Dublin baker,
and a fourth of about the same class.
This was no more foreseen by the landlords when the
ballot was introduced any more than we anticipated the way
in which we were to be plundered. Many considered that
the confiscation of the Irish Church, which had been established
since the reign of Elizabeth, was an inroad into the rights
of property very likely to be followed up by further aggres-
sions, but we never looked for such a wholesale violation
as ensued.
By the Act of 1870 no tenant could be turned out
without being paid a sum averaging a fourth of the fee-
simple in addition to being paid for his improvements, and
there the most observant of us thought the worst had been
reached.
When the Act of 1881 was passed, I met Lord Spencer,
one of the authors of it, and said to him : —
' This Act will have as much effect in settling Ireland
as throwing a cup of dirty water into the Thames would
have in creating a flood.'
My words were soon proved right, for the tenants, having
obtained half the landlord's property by it, thought that by
well working their voting and shooting powers they would get
the remainder.
I have been getting away from my own experiences to
give my own convictions. When you have meditated for
twenty years amid the ruins of what you had been building
up all your life long and know that it is due to Irish outrage
and English misrule, there is a temptation to speak plainly on
breaking silence.
The year 1878 was a wet year and yielded a bad harvest ;
204 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
1879 was worse. The prosperity of Ireland depends on
its harvest, and starvation is the opportunity of the lying
agitator.
On July 8, 1880, I gave evidence before the Royal
Commission on Agriculture, being mainly examined by the
president, the Duke of Richmond and Gordon, others on
the board being Lord Carlingford, Mr. Stansfeld, afterwards
Lord, Mr. Joseph Cowen, and Mr. Mitchell Henry.
Here are some of my statements on a then experience of
thirty-one years : —
' The expenditure by landlords on farm buildings is as
great in Ireland as in Scotland.'
* In the exceptional state of things I strongly disapprove of
tenant-right in Ireland, which, as Lord Palmerston said, is
landlord wrong.'
' Small holdings are a very bad thing in Ireland where they
are not mixed with large holdings.'
* The distress in Kerry is considerable, but has been
considerably exaggerated.'
' Every tenant in Ireland has six months to redeem after
he is evicted.'
' I have never known a man leave a farm unless
compelled.'
'I contradict the statement that tenants make improve-
ments which tend to increase the letting value of the
land.'
' You pay four times as much for spade tillage as for
ploughing by horse.'
' Bad farming in Ireland is due to want of education and to
the enhanced subdivision of the land. When the farmer gets
higher up the social scale he will have more sense than to make
beggars of his children by subdivision.'
A GLANCE AT MY STEWARDSHIP 205
' Distress has not produced the discontent.'
' Almost more land has been sold in Kerry than in any
county in Ireland.*
Three months later, in my evidence before the Irish Land
Act Commission, in answer to the Chairman, I stated that in
my opinion it was simply impossible to arbitrate on rent. I
had two tenants of my own whose yearly rent was ^20 and
whose valuation was ^^20. One of them in 1880 sold £i2S
worth of pigs and butter, and the other man's children were
assisted in charity from my house, though both had equal
means of success.
I also pointed out that there were then 300,000 occupiers
of land in Ireland, whose holdings were under ^8 Poor Law
valuation, and these occupiers when their potatoes failed had
nothing but relief works, starvation, or emigration. To give
them their whole rent would not meet the difficulty.
I submitted a scheme of purchase, in which Baron Dowse
was greatly interested, and I suggested that all holdings under
^4 a year should be ejected at Petty Sessions, because it was
a great hardship for the tenant of such a holding to have
£2, I OS. costs put upon him.
I ended with : —
' There is a case in this county in connection with which
there is likely to be very considerable disturbance. A man
had a farm put up for sale and a Nationalist bought it at a
very low figure, on the understanding that he was to keep it
for the man's family ; but as soon as he got it he turned
Conservative and kept it.'
Baron Dowse — ' Turned what ^ *
Myself — * Conservative.'
Baron Dowse — ' Rogue, I would say. You would not
say that Conservatives are rogues ? '
2o6 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Since that was a debatable point on which the Commission
had no jurisdiction to inquire, I returned no answer.
As the distress was alluded to above, I may lighten the
recent seriousness of my observations by an anecdote on the
topic.
In 1880 the Duchess of Marlborough organised a fund
for supplying the people with meal. The Dublin Mansion
House did the same, but their meal was of a coarser
description.
A Blasquet Islander was asked how he was getting on,
and made answer : —
' Illigant, glory be to the Saints. We 're eating the
Duchess, and feeding two pigs on the Mansion House.'
This recalls the story of the Englishman who inquired of
a Kerry man which measure of English legislation had proved
most beneficial for Ireland.
* The Famine (of 1879) was the best, beyond a shadow of
doubt,' was the reply, ' for I fattened and sold ninety fine
turkeys on the strength of it.'
In 1880 some Kerry men did a very good stroke of
business. They sent a cargo of potatoes from Killorglin to
Scotland and brought them back as imported Champion seed,
selling them for six times the original price.
About this period Mr. Leeson-Marshall, who had been
away from Kerry and coming back found some cottages near
Milltown still only half built, observed : —
' Good God, aren't those houses finished yet ? '
' Well, sor,' was the reply, ' the contract 's finished but the
houses aren't.'
And it has been my life-long experience that ninety-five
per cent, of all the penalties in contracts are worthless, as the
contractors themselves are only too well aware.
A GLANCE AT MY STEWARDSHIP 207
Being a land agent, I wish to provide some account
from another pen of my stewardship, for which said steward-
ship I was falsely called ' the most rack-renting agent in
Ireland.'
Out of Mr. Finlay Dun's book, from which I have pre-
viously quoted, I condense the following from the chapter he
devoted to the estates for which I was agent.
He observes that in 1 8 8 1 my firm had the supervision of
eighty-eight estates, upwards of three thousand farming tenants,
and annually collected rents to the value of a quarter of a
million sterling. From the particulars I furnished him he
deduces : —
' So recently as the end of November the Lady Day rents
had been well paid up ; old arrears had been reduced ; on
two estates in the Court of Chancery ^6000 had been collected
with only a few shillings in default. Dairy farmers prospering
had been particularly well able to pay rents and other claims.
More recent rent collections, unfortunately, were not so satis-
factory. Tenants generally had earned the money, but had
not been allowed to pay it over.
' Many of the low-rented estates were badly farmed and
the tenantry in low water. On the higher rented, the struggle
for existence had brought out extra industry and energy and
led to fair success.'
The following provided an apt illustration : —
' Mr. Gould Adams of Kilmachill had a small estate on the
north side of a hill rented at 20s. an acre ; the rents were paid
up, the tenants doing well. On the southern aspect of the
same hill, with better land, at the devoutly desiderated Griffith's
valuation, which was i6s. 4d., the tenants were invariably
hard up, some of them two years in arrears. All tenants had
free sale, averaging five years' rent.
2o8 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
' The larger proprietors, as a rule, were most helpful and
liberal to their tenants. Where improvements were not
effected or initiated by the landlords, they were seldom done
at all. There had often been considerable difficulty in over-
coming the prejudice and " the rest-and-be-thankful " spirit
both of landlords and tenants.
' On Sir George Colthurst's Ballyvourney estate, twenty
miles east of Killarney, under Mr. Hussey's auspices about
j^ 30,000 had been expended in draining, building, and road-
making. The economic value of many holdings had been
doubled, although the rents had only been increased five per
cent., and subsequently the Commissioners fixed the rents at
25 per cent, less than they had been fifty years earlier.
' The extending village of Mill Street had been in great
measure reconstructed by his exertions.
' The Land League having enforced non-payment of rent,
the obligation to meet other debts was weakened. Although
there was more money than usual in the hands of the farming
community, shopkeepers were not so willingly and promptly
paid as formerly. Want of security checked the improved
business which should have set in after a good harvest. The
Land League agitation generally originated with the publicans,
small shopkeepers, and bankrupt farmers, rather than with
the actual land occupiers. For peace and protection, many
pay their subscription to the League and allow their names to
be enrolled. The intimidation and ' boycotting,' which was
so widely had recourse to, rendered it dangerous for either
farmers or tradesmen to make a stand against the mob. With
Sam Weller it was regarded expedient to shout with the biggest
crowd.'
Thus wrote a critical visitor keenly surveying the situa-
tion in no prejudiced spirit, having gone on a visit to
A GLANCE AT MY STEWARDSHIP 209
Ireland to inquire into the subjects of land tenure and estate
management.
In his next chapter is a tribute to Lord Kenmare, ' a kind
and considerate landlord, united to his people by strong ties of
race and creed, residing for a great part of the year on his
estates, ready with purse and influence to advance the interests
of his neighbourhood. On his mansion and on the town of
Killarney, since his accession to the property in 1871, he has
spent j^ 1 00,000. At his own expense he has erected a town
hall, and improved and beautified Killarney. Within the
last twenty years ^10,000 of arrears have been written off.
From last year's rents ten to twenty per cent, was deducted.
During the last few years of distress, ^^ 15,000 has been
borrowed for draining and other improvements ; regular
work has thus been found for the labourer ; on such outlay
in many instances no percentage has been charged. Since
1870, three hundred labourers have been comfortably housed
and provided with gardens or allotments varying from one
to three pounds annually.'
I could not myself so tersely put the situation to-day
as by quoting this contemporary narrative, the facts for
which I supplied.
Once more let me draw upon Mr. Finlay Dun. ' Un-
mindful of all this consistent liberality, ungrateful for the
great efforts to improve his poorer neighbours, popular pre-
judice has been roused against Lord Kenmare ; it has been
impossible to collect rents ; threatening letters have been
sent to him. Mortified with the apparent fruitlessness of his
humane endeavours he has been compelled to leave Killarney
House.
* His agent, Mr. Hussey, who for twenty years has been
earnestly and intelligently labouring to improve Irish agri-
o
2IO REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
culture, to bring more capital to bear on it, to render it
more profitable, and has, besides, most energetically striven
to elevate and house more decently the labouring population,
has also brought down on himself the odium of the powers
that be. For months he has had to travel armed and guarded
by a couple of constables ; now he has thought it discreet to
leave the country.'
This, however, is erroneous. I only took a house for my
family in London for the winter, and was backwards and
forwards between Kerry and the metropolis.
Against all this let me set another quotation. In New Tork
Tablet iov 1880, a letter from Daniel O'Shea, who stated that
for a large number of years he was a resident in Killarney.
' Among the most prominent tyrants was Lord Kenmare,
who has so recently surpassed himself and his antecedents in
despotism. He is a lineal descendant of the original land
thief, Valentine Brown, who was a special pet of ' the Virgin
Queen ' Bess, and strange to relate, this descendant of that
Brown is a much-favoured pet of John Brown's Queen. Let
me explain that he lives with the Queen in London where he
holds the position of chamberlain (j/V). ... At Aghadoe
House now resides that ruthless Sam Hussey. Allow me
to give you an outline of this heartless fellow's antecedents.
This Hussey is of English origin and was formerly a cattle-
dealer, and practised usury as far back as 1845. ^^ ^'^
Ireland were to be searched for a similar despot he would
not be found. He is a regular anti-Christ and Orangeman
at heart, and, in fact, he acts as agent for all the bankrupt
landlords in Kerry. An English-Irish landlord is an alien
in heart, a despot by instinct, an absentee by inclination ;
and all the foul confederacy of landlordism in Kerry is always
in direct opposition to the cause of Ireland.'
A GLANCE AT MY STEWARDSHIP 211
There is a copious mendacity about that effusion which
makes me think the real mission of the writer should have
been to become an Irish Member of Parliament. His powers
of misrepresentation would have raised him to an eminence
among obstructionists.
After all, scurrilous denunciation never affected me. His
life by Sir Wemyss Reid reveals how Mr. W. E. Forster
flinched under the vituperation levelled at his head. But he
was not an Irishman, least of all a Kerry man, and so he
never felt the fun of the fray, the grim earnest of the fight
which made me set my teeth and give as good as I received.
Indeed, I '11 take my oath no man had the better of me, either
in bandying words or yet in acts, so long as they were open
and above-board, but it has always been the way of sedition
and conspiracy to hit below the belt.
CHAPTER XIX
MURDER, OUTRAGE AND CRIME
Once launched upon memories of those horrible perpetrations
by so-called Christians, which disgraced alike my native
country and all Christendom (because the criminals nominally
worshipped the same God, and professed reverence to Him),
I could enumerate instances until I had filled a volume.
You know how the Ghost told Hamlet that he could a
tale unfold, whose lightest word would harrow up his soul.
Why, I could tell five score, and still not have exhausted the
roll of crime.
As my experience is mainly connected with Kerry, it is
characteristically Irish for me to start with an example from
County Cork. The outrage was on the Rathcole estate of
Sir George Colthurst. The rental was ^1500, and the land-
lord had expended ^^ 10,000 on improvements, so that it was
not to be wondered that the labourers should meet to celebrate
their employer's marriage.
Nor to any one knowing Ireland was it surprising that
the Land League should have despatched one of their well-
armed bands to fire on them for so doing.
This was apparently a challenge to Kerry not to be out-
done in barbarity by Cork, her neighbour and rival.
Kerry was quite equal to current demands on her in-
humanity.
A labourer of the M'Gilly cuddy s was visited by another
212
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 213
Land League detachment and had his ear, a la Bulgaria, cut
clean oiF to the bone, because he worked on a farm from
which a tenant had been evicted.
The next night a small Protestant farmer near Tralee
found his best cow tortured and killed because he had sold
milk to the police.
On the same night a farmer's house was sacked because
he had bought some * boycotted ' hay.
Still on the same night, at Millstreet, another Land
League gang attacked a house, one of the Land League police
being killed, and one of the Crown police wounded.
In fact, all law save Land League law was for a time at an
end in Munster.
At one Kerry Assize, a criminal caught by four policemen
in the very act of breaking into a house, was acquitted, and
at the Cork Assize the Crown Prosecutor, after half a dozen
acquittals, announced he would not continue the farce of
putting criminals on their trial.
I mentioned boycotting just now, but I am tempted to
pause, because a new generation that knows not Parnellism,
nor the extent of crime in that unhappy period, may not be
aware of the origin of the term.
Captain Boycott was agent for Lord Erne's Mayo estates,
and laid out the whole of his capital ^6000, in improving and
stocking his own property. Because, in the course of his
duty, he served some ejectment notices, he was denounced
by the Land League, his farm servants were terrorised into
leaving his employment, and when he imported fifty labourers
from the north of Ireland to save his crops, the Government
had to despatch a small army corps of troops and constabulary
to protect them. So great was the power of the League, that
even in Dublin the landlord of a hotel declined to let him
214 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
stop more than twenty-four hours in the house, as he was
threatened if he ventured to harbour him. For the protec-
tion of his life and no more, the unfortunate gentleman had
to leave the country.
Baron Dowse said in charging the Grand Jury of the
Connaught Western Assize, that this case had ' excited the
wonder and amazement of a great part of the United Kingdom
and the sorrow of a considerable portion of Ireland.' Very
soon the name of Boycott was given to the approved method
of actively sending a man to Coventry, or threatening his life
and property as well as refusing to permit him to be supplied
with even the bare necessities of existence.
Baron Dowse, a man who had no fear of unmanly criminals,
justly styled this a reign of terror.
Kerry is divided into six Poor Law Unions, three of them
— Kenmare, Cahirciveen and Dingle — are very poor districts;
but there was practically not an outrage in them. Killarney,
Tralee and Listowel are rich by comparison, Tralee being the
richest of the three, and Castleisland the wealthiest portion of
the district. There were nearly as many outrages there as in
the whole of the rest of the country, which shows that poverty
was not the cause.
I was in and out of Castleisland, but though I had a sheaf
of threatening letters, I never met with any insults or received
a threat to my face.
Only once did I overhear any hostile mutterings. This
was when I was driving out of Tralee, and my coachman
stopped to give a message in the dusk at a house on the out-
skirts of the town.
Suddenly two or three men came up, and one said : —
' Now 's the time to settle old Hussey.'
Old Hussey — to use their accurate nomenclature — popped
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 215
his head out of the window, and also his right hand which
held a most serviceable revolver and invited them to come on.
They did not. In fact they scattered with a rapidity
which proved they had not imbibed enough whisky to affect
their legs or give them courage.
This will show that my business — to collect what was due
to the landlords I represented — was not always agreeable work
or always easy. But my duty was to get in rents, and so I
got them, whenever I could.
The tenants did not all pay direct, for many were far too
frightened. Quite a number, even of the Roman Catholics,
used to send the money through the Protestant clergy.
How they settled this in the confessional I do not know,
possibly it was a trifle they did not consider worth troubling
the priest with.
Three tenants on Lord Kenmare's estate came into my
office on one occasion, and said they would like to pay their
rent, but were afraid of the Land League,
I treated their fears as arrant nonsense, but told them to
come and argue it out with me in my own room.
So soon as they could not be seen by any one they paid
up.
Within a few days an armed party went to their houses
and shot the three in their legs.
One man's life was despaired of for some time, but finally
they all recovered.
This outrage was a rather late one, because the Land
League latterly decided to shoot objectionable characters only
in the legs, because though a fuss was made at the time, if a
man was killed it was soon forgotten afterwards, whereas a
lame man was a lifelong testimony to their power.
There is a man hobbling about Castleisland to this day>
2i6 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
who was peppered in this comparatively humanitarian way.
I am quite sure he would say such a comparison had proved
odious.
Judge Barry very truly said that a thatched cabin on a
mountain-side was not much of a place of defence, and if the
tenant was supposed to have paid his rent, he would be told
to run out with probably three men standing at the door to
shoot him. That was terrorism as inculcated by the so-called
friends of Ireland.
Mr. Forster in his plucky speech to the crowd at Tulla-
more, said : —
* I went when I was at Tulla to the workhouse, and there
saw a poor fellow lying in bed, the doctors around him, with
a blue light over his face that made me feel that the doctors
were not right, when they told me he might get over it. I
felt sure that he must die, and I see this morning that he has
died. But why did that man die ? He was a poor lone
farmer. I believe he had paid his rent — I believe he had
committed that crime. He thought it his duty to pay.
Fifteen or sixteen men broke into his house in the middle
of the night, pulled him out of his bed and told him they
would punish him. He himself, lying in his death agony as
it were, told me the story. He said, " My wife went down
on her knees and said, ' Here are five helpless children, will
you kill their father ? ' " They took him out, they discharged
a gun filled with shot into his leg, so closely that they shattered
his leg.'
Now there were dozens of instances of that kind of thing
in Kerry.
Mr. Parnell started the whole vile crusade, when at Ennis
he gave the advice to shun any man who had bid for a farm
from which a tenant had been evicted.
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 217
' Shun him in the street, in the shop, in the marketplace,
even in the place of worship, as if he were a leper of old.'
His words were implicitly obeyed, and outrage followed
mere boycotting till the rapid succession of crimes prevented
each one having its full effect in horrifying civilised Europe.
A very bad case occurred in Millstreet.
Jeremiah Haggerty was a large farmer and shopkeeper.
There was no objection to him, except that he declined to
join the Land League, for which his shop was boycotted,
which he told me meant the loss of a thousand a year to
him, but the League failed to boycott his farm, because he
was too good an employer.
He was fired at coming into Millstreet, and the outrage
had been so openly planned, that it was talked of on the
preceding evening in every whisky store.
On another occasion he was leaving Millstreet station,
about a mile from the town, and when about twenty yards
from the station he was fired at and forty grains of shot
lodged in the back of his head, neck, and body. As it was
twilight, a railway porter obligingly held up his lantern to
give the miscreants a better view of their victim.
He was a man of most honourable and upright character,
who had worked his way up, and he has now regained his
popularity. He started as a clerk in quite a small way, and
must now be worth a very large sum of money. I was
instrumental in getting him made a magistrate, and I have
the greatest respect for him.
I regard this as a decidedly serious example, because of
the popularity of the victim, and also because he had offended
no one by word or deed. Still, there were, of course, many
instances which were even more outrageous.
A farmer, name of Brown, was shot at Castleisland. Two
2i8 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
men were arrested for the murder, and were twice tried before
Cork juries. The first disagreed, but the second found them
guilty.
A subscription was made up for the families of the two
murderers, to which contributions were made by the leading
shopkeepers of several neighbouring towns. For several
years afterwards, Mrs. Brown could not get a man to dig
her potatoes, nor a woman to milk her cows, although she
had tendered no evidence at the trial, and it was clearly proved
that Brown had given no cause of offence.
But, as a Land Leaguer said to me, it was suspected that
he might be in a position to do so.
Red Indians, or any other barbarians you can think of,
would not have been guilty of wreaking vengeance on the
widow of an innocent murdered man, nor of endowing the
wives of his assassins.
Here is another murder story.
A caretaker on an evicted farm on the property of Lord
Cork, near Kanturk, was murdered for taking charge of it.
The evicted tenant had owed eleven years' rent.
Lord Cork had agreed to accept one year's rent in full
acquittal, and so good a landlord was he, that the neighbours
of the debtor offered to make up the amount to that sum.
The tenant firmly declined to pay, because he said another
year would bring him within the statute of limitations.
So then he had to be evicted.
Two men were clearly identified as having perpetrated the
unprovoked crime of assassinating the temporary occupant of
the property, and were arrested.
The Gladstonian Attorney-General, in order to curry
popularity, declined to challenge the jury, when the first man
was put on his trial. Consequently three cousins of the
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 219
prisoner were impanelled, the jury disagreed, and the wretch
bolted to America that same night.
The second man, though less guilty, was duly tried before
a challenged jury, and not only sentenced but hanged.
He was the organiser of outrages for Cork, and his
brother held the similar delectable office for Kerry. A good
deal of the impunity with which crime was committed was due
to the change in the jury laws, by which so low a class of man
was summoned into the box, that criminals began to consider
conviction impossible. To my mind it was quite worth the
consideration of the Cabinet of the time, whether trial by jury
ought not to be abolished in Ireland — indeed, even to-day,
I can see few reasons for its retention and many for its
abolition.
Anyhow in the bad times I am now dealing with, to send
persons for trial before a jury was but to advertise the weak-
ness of the law.
Two men at Tralee were suspected of having paid their
rent to me, and in spite of their assurances that they were
quite innocent and had not paid a farthing for two years, it
was necessary for the police to escort them after nightfall to
their homes about four miles away, and to advise them not
to venture into the town for a long while after.
One of the worst features, however, of all this terrible
period was that helpless girls and women were victims as well
as men. I know of a case where some ruffians entered the
house of a family at night, went into the bedroom of one of
the girls, seized her violently, forced her on her knees, and
held her in that position while one of the gang cut off her hair
with shears, and then poured a quantity of hot tar on her
head before entering the bedroom of her sister to do the
same.
2 20 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
A similar fate befell two girls named Murphy merely
because they were suspected of speaking to a policeman.
A man named Finlay was boycotted and then shot dead,
and the neighbours jeered and laughed at his wife, when in
her agony she was wringing her hands in grief.
The poor woman went into the street and knelt down
crying : —
' The curse of God rest upon Father for being the
cause of my husband's murder.'
The priest had denounced him from the altar on the
previous Sunday.
' Carding ' has always been a favourite Irish form of
physically insinuating to a man that he is not exactly popular.
It consists of a wooden board with nails in it being drawn down
the naked flesh of a man's face and body. This foul torture
was often heard of, and it has been whispered that women and
even girls have been the victims of this atrocity.
The merciful man is proverbially merciful to his beast, and
those who showed mercy to neither man nor woman had none
on the dumb animals owned by their victims.
A valuable Spanish ass belonging to Mr. M*Cowan of
Tralee was saturated with paraffin, set on fire, and horribly
burned.
A farmer named Lambert found the shoulder of a heifer
had been smashed by some blunt instrument like a hammer.
1 myself had a couple of cows killed and salted.
Indeed cattle outrages became incidents of nightly occur-
rence. Tenants in all disturbed counties, besides having their
houses burnt, saw their cattle so horribly mutilated that the
poor dumb creatures had to be killed to put them out of their
misery. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
would have no chance of obtaining general support among the
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 221
lower classes in Kerry, where beasts belonging to your enemy
are simply regarded as so many goods and chattels, to be as
badly damaged as possible.
It is a curious thing that the Irish and the Italian are the
two most poetic and most sensitive races of Europe, and also
are the two which exhibit the greatest indifference to the
sufferings of dumb animals.
The distress in Kerry, of course, in the winter of 1879
had been as great as in the more famous famine, and I have
heard the theory advanced in a London drawing-room that
physical suffering renders uneducated people indifferent to
any torture endured by animals. Personally, I should have
thought a fellow feeling made us wondrous kind.
Reverting to matters with which I had more personal
connection, an interesting episode occurred in June 1 8 8 1 ,
when The O'Donoghue moved the adjournment of the
House of Commons to force a debate upon the subject of
Lord Kenmare's estate, and I wrote a letter in the Thnes in
reply, from which may be condensed the following facts : —
On the Cork estate, from 1878 to 1881, the evictions did
not average one for each year for every two hundred tenants.
On the Limerick estate for five years there have been no
evictions.
On the Kerry estate, since he succeeded (in 187 1), Lord
Kenmare has expended £^']yiiS °^ drainage, road-making,
and building cottages. The evictions have been about one in
five hundred in every half year. The abatements, allowances,
and expenditure in 1878, '79, '80, and '81, exclusive of what
was spent on the house and demesne, were £z?>->^^S'> ^^^ ^ ^"^
under the mark when I say that, altogether, for these years of
distress. Lord Kenmare spent more on his Kerry estates than
he received out of it ; yet for this, Land League meetings were
222 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
held on his estate, and he was denounced in Parliament. The
week that the Land League compelled Lord Kenmare to
discontinue his employment to labourers, the weekly labour
bill was ;^46o.
There is no need to trouble readers with any further
correspondence on a topic on which no one could answer me
except by abuse, which is no argument ; nor will I inflict any
of the letters in which Mr. Sexton was clearly proved in the
wrong when he misrepresented the case of Pat Murphy of
Rath.
As an example of the state of affairs, in Millstreet — a mere
village — there were thirty cases of nocturnal raid in the month
of August 1881, even while it was engaging the attention of
Mr. T. O. Plunkett, R.M., Mr. French, chief of the detective
department, two sub-inspectors, thirty-five constabulary, and
fifty men of the 80th Regiment.
In the Daily 'Telegraphy with reference to the murder of
Gallivan, near Castleisland, this remark appeared in a leader : —
' Horror-stricken humanity demands that an example be
speedily made of the truculent and merciless ruffian who
perpetrated this outrage.'
I quoted this in a letter the editor published, adding : —
' A few weeks after that occasion an old man named Flynn
was shot within two miles of the place, because he paid his
rent. His leg has since been amputated.'
Then I gave the following horrible case : —
On Sunday night the Land League police went to the
house of a man named Dan Dooling, who lived within a mile
of Gallivan's house, and within one mile of Castleisland, and
because he paid his rent on getting a reduction of thirty per
cent., he was taken out and shot in the thigh. His wife, who
was only three days after her confinement, pleaded for mercy
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 223
on this account, but these lynch law authorities were deaf to
the appeal for mercy, and she did not recover the shock of
the entry of these ' moonlight ' Thugs. This man could have
identified his assailants, but he did not dare.
A good fellow called M'Auliffe, whose arm was shot ofF,
could have done the same. The poor chap could be seen
walking about with one arm, deprived of the means of earning
his bread, and no doubt moralising over the state of the law,
which would compensate him for the loss of his cow, if he had
one, but gave him nothing for the loss of his arm.
On Friday, November 18, 188 1, two tenants, named Cronin
and one O'Keefe, holding land from Lord Kenmare, came
into my office in Killarney.
O'Keefe, an old man. of seventy, was the spokesman, and
said : —
* If you plase, sorr, we have the rint in our pocket, and
would be glad to pay it if it were not for the fear that we
have of being shot.'
To my lasting regret, I replied : —
' There is no danger. You must pay.'
They did, and on the Sunday week following, a band of
marauders, headed by fife and drum, went to the houses of
these men, and shot them in the presence of their families.
All the flesh on the lower part of O'Keefe's legs was shot
away, one of the Cronins was shot in the knee, but the other
in the body.
Everybody in the neighbourhood knew the perpetrators of
this ghastly outrage, but said : —
' What use would there be in our telling, as the jury would
acquit them, and we should be shot .'' '
Then came this announcement, which caused great excite-
ment in Killarney : —
2 24 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
' In consequence of the difficulty of getting his rents, the
Earl of Kenmare has decided to leave the country for the
present. All the labourers employed on the estate are
discharged, as well as some of the gamekeepers.'
My own opinion was that he showed great wisdom in
abandoning the ungrateful locality where only man, debased
by the Land League, was vile.
Outside my own folk, I found the people stiffer and less
affable than formerly ; but at no time had I any difficulty in
obtaining or keeping domestic servants, though my wife got
the majority from the neighbourhood of Edenburn.
I used to sit, on and off, on the bench as regularly as most
of the other magistrates, whenever, indeed, my business per-
mitted me to do so, and to my face no one ventured to
abuse me.
Quite late in the bad times when I wanted a decree of
ejectment against a fellow, the chairman, desiring to make
peace, explained that his hesitation was entirely on my account,
to save me from danger,
I replied that I had not quailed all those years, and I was
too old to begin ; so I had my decree, and that fellow's threats
were as contemptuously treated as all the rest.
The Bank had a decree against a tenant of mine, and,
having sold him out, entered Into possession and put in a
caretaker.
He was in occupation about eight hours, when he grew so
frightened that he ran away. The tenant then went back into
possession as a caretaker, whom nobody dared dislodge, and
he promptly went to the Tralee Board of Guardians to obtain
a pound a week as an evicted tenant.
At that time two-thirds of the poor-rate was paid by the
landlord. When the tenancy was over £^ a year, they had
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 225
to allow each tenant half the rate he paid ; when it was under
this sum, they had to pay the whole of it, and, of course, all
the rates for land in their own occupation.
Thus the Board of Guardians were utilising the money of
the landlords in order to remunerate the men who were robbing
them of their property.
If a tenant — who generally had some money — was evicted,
a notice was served on the relieving officer to provide him
with a conveyance, in which he was taken to the poorhouse ;
but if a farmer evicted a labourer — who had, perhaps, nothing
but the suit of clothes in which he stood up — he was allowed
to walk to the poorhouse as best he might, and, when he got
there, he obtained no special relief.
It is true that the passing of the Habeas Corpus Suspension
Act offered another opportunity to the Government for striking
a severe blow, but it was frittered away, although, before it
became law, many of the leaders of disorder left the country,
dreading its provisions.
Instead, the isolated arrests revealed that the criminals
were provided with special accommodation and superior fare.
A district officer, asked by Lord Spencer for his views on
the Coercion Act, replied : —
' The only coercion I can perceive, your Excellency, is that
people accustomed to live on potatoes and milk are forced to
feed on salmon and wine.'
The last outrage I intend to mention in this chapter was a
very remarkable one.
There was a contest for the chairmanship of the Tralee
Board of Guardians. The Land League put forward a candi-
date who was at the time an inmate of Kilmainham gaol. The
landlords, who at this earlier stage still had some power,
conceived that the residence of the Home Ruler would not
p
226 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
facilitate his control over the Board, and chose a candidate
whose abode was not only more adjacent, but whose
movements were unfettered.
The voting was even, until Mr. A. E. Herbert came into
the room and gave his casting vote against the involuntary
tenant of the Kilmainham hostelry. For this he was murdered
three days later, and by the crime they hoped to ensure that
on the next occasion the landlords would abstain from voting
at all.
That murder of Mr. Arthur Herbert on his return from
Petty Sessions at Castleisland was one of the worst, and as an
exhibition of infernal hatred and vengeance it transcended the
murders of Lord Mountmorres and Lord Leitrim. It cannot
be denied that Mr. Herbert committed acts of a harsh and
overbearing character. He was a turbulent, headstrong man,
brave to rashness and foolhardiness, and too fond of pro-
claiming his contempt for the people by whom he was
surrounded. As a magistrate, sitting at Brosna Petty Sessions,
he expressed his regret that he was not in command of a force
when a riot occurred in that village, when he would have
' skivered the people with buckshot,' language brought
under the notice of the Lord Chancellor and the House of
Commons,
He was the son of a clergyman, and lived at Killeentierna
House with his mother, a venerable old lady over eighty, he
being himself forty-five. His income was estimated at about
four hundred a year, and as his relations with tenantry were not
harmonious, he never went out without a six -chambered
revolver in his pocket. Physically he was very robust — over
five feet ten in height, and very corpulent. In his own
neighbourhood he always was known as ' Mr. Arthur.'
Leaving Castleisland about five in the afternoon, he was
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 227
accompanied for about a mile by the head constable, who then
turned back. Mr. Herbert had not proceeded a quarter of a
mile further when he was felled by the assassins. The spot
chosen was singularly open, no shelter being visible for some
distance. Several shots were heard by a labourer at work in a
quarry, and when he came up he found Mr. Herbert lying on
his face in the road, quite dead, the earth about him being
covered with pools of blood. The body was almost riddled
with shot and bullets.
That night a further illustration of the vindictive ferocity
of the outrage was given. The lawn in front of Killeen-
tierna was patrolled regularly by some of the large body of
police which at once occupied the house. On this lawn eleven
lambs were grazing. At half-past two these were seen by the
police to be all right. At daybreak the eleven were found
stabbed with pitchforks — nine of them killed outright, and
two wounded to death. This act, as wretched as it was
daring, added a new horror to the crime.
Mr. Herbert's murder was received with such exuberant
delight in Kerry that my steward said to me : —
' You would think, sir, that rent was abolished and the duty
taken off whisky.'
Constabulary had for a long while to be told off to prevent
his grave being desecrated.
That is a pretty tough outrage for optimistic philanthro-
pists to consider when they are addicted to announcing how
far our generations have progressed from barbarism.
The price of blood in Kerry was not high. For example,
the men that murdered FitzMaurice were paid £^ for the
job, and they had never seen him before. His family had
to be under police protection for five years, and I managed
to get ;^iooo subscribed for them in England, Mr. Froude
228 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
taking an enthusiastic and generous interest in a very
sad case. The victim left two daughters, who both married
policemen.
One young and cheery Kerry landlord was very proud,
about 1886, at the price of forty shillings being offered for his
life by the Land League, whereas nearly all the others were
only valued at half a sovereign apiece.
As a matter of fact, almost any one could have been shot
at Castleisland if a sovereign were offered, for they cared no
more for human life than for that of a rat. Parnell himself
would have been shot by any one of a couple of dozen fellows
willing to earn a dishonest living if a five-pound note had been
locally put upon his head. A patriotic philanthropist, destitute
of the bowels of compassion and of every dictate of humanity,
might have saved a great deal of undeserved suffering if he
had made this donation towards his ' removal ' — a pretty
euphemism of Land League coinage.
Most of that generation are dead, in gaol, or have emigrated.
It would take the deuce of a big sum to tempt any Castle-
islander to-day to commit murder, except under provocation,
and the same improvement is observable all over Ireland. I
believe a hundred pounds might be put on the head of the
least popular agent or landlord, and he might walk unscathed
without police protection.
All that has been set forth in this chapter might be regarded
as a heavy indictment of crime and disorder, but I cannot avoid
adding one confirmatory piece of evidence, as eloquent as it is
accurate. This is the fearful description of the state of Kerry
which appears in Judge O'Brien's charge to the Grand Jury at
the Assizes, founded, of course, on the report of outrages
submitted to him. It is impossible to guess in what stronger
words his opinions would have been expressed if the total
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 229
number of outrages committed had been laid before him ; but
it is well known that only a few of those committed were re-
ported, as, if the criminals were taken up and identified, the
victims would be likely to be shot in revenge, while the guilty
persons, tried by a sympathising jury, would obtain acquittal
and popular advertisement.
The charge was as follows : —
* Colonel Crosbie and Gentlemen of the Grand
Jury of Kerry — I requested your permission to defer any
observations I was about to make to you, in order that I
might have an opportunity of examining certain returns which
had been made to me containing materials for forming a
judgment upon the state of things in this county of which I
was put in possession upon my arrival, and I was desirous of
being afforded an opportunity of examining these materials to
try if I could discern whether, in the considerable lapse of
time that has happened since the last Assizes, I could see any
reason to conclude that an improvement had taken place in the
state of things that has now so long existed in the County of
Kerry, and other counties in the south of Ireland, to try if I
could discern whether lapse of time itself, the weariness of that
state of things, if the law and influences that lead persons to
avoid violations of the law, or to follow the pursuits of industry,
had led in the end to any favourable change in the state of
things ; but I grieve to say that it is not in my power, un-
fortunately, to announce that any change has taken place. On
the contrary, all the means of information that I possess lead
to the unhappy conclusion that there is no improvement, but
that, on the contrary, there exists, even at this moment, a
most extraordinary state of things — a state of things of an
unprecedented description — nothing short, in fact, of a state
of open war with all forms of authority, and even, I may say
230 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
without exaggeration, with the necessary institutions of civilised
life.
* These returns present a picture of the County Kerry such
as can hardly be found in any country that has passed the
confines of natural society and entered upon the duties and
relations, and acknowledged the obligations, of civilised life.
The law is defeated — perhaps I should rather say, has ceased
to exist ! Houses are attacked by night and day, even the
midnight terror yielding to the noonday anxiety of crime !
Person and life are assailed ! The terrified inmates are
wholly unable to do anything to protect themselves, and a
state of terror and lawlessness prevails everywhere. Even some
persons who possess means of information that are not open to
me, profess to discern in the signs of public feeling, in the
views of some hope and some fear, the expectation of some-
thing about to happen, something reaching far beyond partial,
or local, or even agrarian, disturbance, and calculated to create
a greater degree of alarm than anything we have witnessed, or
anything that has happened.
' When I come to compare the official returns of crime
with those of the preceding period, I find that the total number
of offences in this county since the last Assizes is somewhat
less in number, even considerably less in number, than in the
corresponding or the preceding period of the former years.
But the diminution of number affords no assurance or ground
of improvement at all, because I find that the diminution is
accounted for entirely in the class of offences that acknowledges
to some extent the power and influence of the law, namely, in
threatening letters and notices, while the amount of open and
actual crime is greater than it was in the former period, show-
ing that there is an increased confidence in impunity, and that
menace has given place to the deed. Within not more than
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 231
ten days from the time that I am now speaking, not less than
four examples of midnight invasion of houses in this county-
have occurred, accompanied with all the usual incidents of dis-
guises and arms, and the firing of shots, and violence threatened
or committed ; in one instance the outrage having been com-
mitted upon the residence of a magistrate of this county, a
man living with his family in his home, in the supposed
delusive security of domestic life, of law, and respect for
social station ; and in another instance committed upon a
humble man, and encountered, I am glad to say, in that
instance, with a brave resistance, giving an example of courage
which, if it were widely imitated, many of the evils that this
country suffers from would no longer exist.
' I need not dwell upon the most aggravated instance of
all which this calendar of crime presents — one that is quite
recent, and within the memory of you all — the murder of
Cornelius Murphy, a humble man, but one enjoying
apparently the confidence and respect of all his neighbours,
who had done no harm to any person, who was not conscious
of any offence, whose house was invaded at a still early hour
of the evening, and before the daylight had departed, by a
band of men that is shown to have traversed a considerable
distance of country, giving opportunities of recognition to
many, and with hardly the pretext of an offence on his part,
and in reality with the object of private plunder or private
hostility — one of those motives that always take advantage of
a state of disturbance in order to gratify private ends — slain in
his own house in the presence of his own family. Certain
persons, it would appear, have been arrested on a charge of
complicity with this crime, and it may be that this cruel and
wicked crime may be the means of discovering other crimes,
and of leading in the end to the detection, if not to the con-
232 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
viction, of persons who have been connected in them, and
those who rest in the supposed confidence of impunity may
find the spell broken, may find the light of information to
reach them, and may find in the end that the law will be able
to prevail; because it must be in the experience of many of
you that it is unhappily in the power of a few persons who
engage in this system of nightly invasion of houses to multiply
themselves, apparently by means of terror and intimidation,
although at the same time there can be no doubt that, on
account of interval of distances, and for many such reasons,
there must be many such combinations in this country, acting
entirely independent of each other.
' No person can be at a loss to understand the misery and
suffering that arises from a state of crime ; but perhaps all
persons in the community do not equally understand one form
of consequence to material prosperity that results from it,
I have . before me a document that contains most terribly
significant evidence of mischief, alike to all classes of the
community, that results from crime and a state of social
disturbance. I have a return of malicious injuries which
form the subject of presentment at these Assizes, in number,
I understand, exceeding all former precedent. There are no
less than eighty-six presentments, representing all forms of
wicked outrage upon property, a tempest — I might say with-
out exaggeration, a tempest — of violence and crime that has
swept over a considerable portion of this county. The claims
amount to £i']00, with the result that the Grand Jury had
presented upon a certain part of this county ^^1250, exercising
apparently the greatest care and discrimination in reducing
the amount of the claims, and this ^1250 was not put upon
the whole county, but on certain parts of the county, and the
amount at the very least aggravated in a most serious degree
MURDER, OUTRAGE, AND CRIME 233
the weight of taxation that falls upon the ratepayers of the
County Kerry, deepening the difficulties that all classes alike
must experience from the depression of the times, and from
the other burdens they have to meet in providing against
the demands that are made upon them.
' But, of course, you can easily understand that these things
do not at all give you any idea of other forms of material
injury that arise from crime and disturbance, in the loss of
employment and the discouragement of capital, the injury to
trade, and the multiplied consequences of all kinds detrimental
to the community that arise from insecurity to personal
property and life. And to all those evils we have to add
another, and perhaps the worst of all — that of which you are
all conscious, of which experience and observation reaches you
every day in all the forms of social life — a system of unseen
terrorism, a system of terror and tyranny that the well-disposed
class of the community ought to detest and abhor, and in
reference to which, on all sides, I have heard, in this county
and other counties, one universal expression of desire — that
some means should be found to put an end to it.
' I possess no power myself to effect this state of things,
and I cannot say that in the relation to the law which you fill
as members of the Grand Jury, or in any other relation to the
law, you possess the means to effect it. The duty of pro-
viding against so great an evil existing in the community — the
duty and the obligation rests with others. My duty is simply
confined to representing to you the state of things that exists,
and, indeed, in that respect I know that I am doing what
is entirely unnecessary, for the state of the County Kerry now,
and for a period of five or six years, in all its essential features,
is known far beyond the limits of the county, to every single
person in the country. I will merely make use of one general
234 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
observation — that I by no means share in the opinion that has
been expressed as to the inabiHty to deal with this state of
things. On the contrary, I entertain the most perfect con-
fidence that it is in the power of those who are intrusted with
the duty of maintaining the public peace to re-establish order
and law and peace in this county. And as my duty is confined
to representing that state of things, that duty does not carry me
to indicate to those on whom the responsibility rests the means
to attain that object.'
CHAPTER XX
THE EDENBURN OUTRAGE
In the early part of the winter of 1884, so bad did the state
of Kerry become, and so menacing was the attitude of the
Land Leaguers towards myself, that I felt I had no right to
endanger the lives of my wife and daughters by any longer
permitting them to reside at Edenburn.
In all those years, from 1878 to 1884, be it noted that I
gave more employment in Kerry than any one man, a fact
which has been testified to by different parish priests, but at
the same time I was agent for a great many landlords, and
tried my level best to get in rents for my employers.
For this cause my life had been repeatedly threatened,
and now, in November 1884, dynamite was put to my house,
the back of it being badly blown up. There were sixteen
individuals in the house, mostly women and children, and an
attempt was therefore made to murder them all in the effort
to take the life of one individual they were afraid to meet
in the open.
The house was repaired and I received compensation in
due course from the County, but my family did not think
after what had occurred that Edenburn was a desirable place
of residence. So I henceforth resided much in London, and
therefore spent a great deal less money in Kerry.
Perhaps, however, I had better be a little more diffuse
about what was known all over the British Isles as the Eden-
235
236 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
burn Outrage, but the bulk of this chapter will be drawn
from observations by members of my family and newspaper
accounts, for the episode left considerably less impression on
my mind than it did on that of my womenfolk, and indeed
on the public, at the time.
To show how matters stood, one of my daughters reminds
me that I gave her a very neat revolver as a present, and
that whenever she came back from school she always slept
with it under her pillow. Moreover, she recollects that
the customary Sunday afternoon pursuit was to have revolver
practice at the garden gate.
There had been several episodes of an ugly nature ; for
example, one of my sons competing in some sports at Tralee
was advised to make an excuse and to go home separately
from the womenfolk.
He took the hint, and my wife with the governess and
several children went back without him in the waggonette.
About a mile and a half from the town, just where the horses
had to walk up a steep hill, a number of men with bludgeons
and sticks came out of a ditch, peered into the trap, and
seeing it contained nothing but women and children let it
pass on with a grunt of disgust, whilst they trudged back
to Tralee.
One of my daughters, years after, on being taken in to
dinner in London, was asked by her companion if she was
any relation of mine.
She having confessed the fact — one I hope in no way
detrimental, though I say so, perhaps, who should not —
he mentioned that he had been to a most cheery dance at
Edenburn, which had made a great impression on his mind,
because for seven miles along the road by which he and
his friends drove there were pickets of constabulary, and
THE EDENBURN OUTRAGE 237
the hall table was piled so full with the revolvers brought by
the guests, that all the hats and coats had to be taken to the
smoking-room.
It may be as well to again mention that my wife during
the very worst periods had never any difficulty in keeping or
obtaining domestic servants. No doubt the maids liked
having two or three stalwart constables always hanging about
the place, and capital odd job men they made.
A constable neatly humbugged a footman, and I may here
mention the incident, though it is subsequent to the episode
of this chapter.
One house we took in London was in Glendower Place,
and when the servants arrived, my wife found that the foot-
man's face was covered with sticking-plaster. He was a
regular gossoon, though shaped like a fine specimen of the
pampered menials who condescend to open the front door of
large mansions to their betters.
A constable had hoaxed him into believing that he could
never walk in the London streets without using firearms,
and having advised him to learn to do so, the idiot put the
weapon against his cheek, and the first kick had knocked
away a voluminous portion of his countenance.
At the end of November 1884, we were packing up to
leave, and all the big cases were in the stable-yard ready to
be carted away. There were five policemen at the time in the
house, and two of them were on sentry duty all through the
night.
None of us had had good nights for some time past, but
on the evening of November 29th I came back from the
meeting of the Board of Guardians at Listowel, and said to
my wife as we sat down to dinner : —
' After all, we are starting for England to-morrow morning
238 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
without any necessity, for I do believe the country is begin-
ning to settle down.'
This is the only occasion on which I ever ventured on a
cheerful prophecy since Ireland came under the baneful spell
of Mr. Gladstone, and it was the most foolish remark I ever
made.
That night came the explosion, but I prefer to let the
press tell the tale.
The Manchester Guardian relates : —
' The explosive matter was placed under an area in the
basement story, dynamite being the agent employed for the
outrage. A large aperture was made in the wall, which is
three feet thick. Several large rents running to the top have
been made, and it now presents a most dilapidated appearance.
The ground-floor, where the explosion occurred, was used as
a larder, and everything in it was smashed to pieces, the glass
window-frames and shutters being shivered into atoms. On
the three stories above it, the explosion produced a similar
effect. To the right of it, one of Mr. Hussey's daughters
was sleeping, and the window of her room was entirely de-
stroyed. Mr. J. E. Hussey, J. P., slept in another room
about thirty feet from the scene of the explosion, and his
window and room fared similarly. The butler slept in a
small room on the basement, which was completely wrecked,
the windows being shattered to pieces, the lamp and toilet
broken, and the greater part of the ceiling thrown on him in
the bed. The length of the house is about fifty yards, and
the windows in the back, numbering twenty-six, have been
altogether destroyed. Mr. S. M. Hussey and his wife slept
in the front, and they were much affected by the explosion.
Three policemen who had been stationed in the house for the
past couple of years slept on a ground-floor in front. The
THE EDENBURN OUTRAGE 239
coach-house and stables near the house were considerably
damaged. In the garden two greenhouses, one about 120
yards away, and the other fully 150, were injured, the greater
portion of the glass being broken and the roofs shaken. In
several houses at long distances the shock was plainly felt.
The dwelling-house subsequently presented a very wrecked
appearance. On looking at the back of it, there are several
rents or cracks to be seen in the solid masonry, and the
slates are shaken and displaced. Everything shows the terrific
force of the explosion. In the yard a large slate-house was
much damaged, the slates being displaced and the roof shaken
and cracked. A large stone was found here, having been
blown from the dwelling-house.'
From the Times may be culled these additional particulars :
' There is a fissure some inches wide in the main wall from
the ground to the roof, and a little more force would have
effected the evident object of making the residence of the
obnoxious agent a heap of ruins. The damage done is
estimated at from £1000 to ;^3000, but this is only a rough
conjecture.'
The Cork Constitutional throws further light in a some-
what badly expressed article : —
' The most extraordinary circumstance connected with the
outrage is the secrecy and stealth which must have been
resorted to in order to avoid detection. It was well known
in the neighbourhood that not alone were three policemen
constantly at Edenburn for Mr. Hussey's protection, but that
a number of dogs were also kept on the premises, and it
is, therefore, astonishing the care and caution which must have
been resorted to in order to successfully lay and explode the
destructive material. Some idea of the force of the explosion
as well as the stability of the building which resisted it in a
240 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
measure, may be gathered from the fact that it was distinctly-
heard in the town of Castleisland four miles away. Mr. R.
Roche, J. P., who lives a mile from Edenburn, also distinctly
heard the explosion, which he describes as resembling in sound
that caused by the fall of a huge tree in close proximity.
Those who were at Edenburn at the time state that between
four and half-past four a low rumbling noise, followed by a
sharp report, was heard. The house trembled and shook to
its foundations. The inmates, some of whom were only
awakened by the shock, were seized with an indescribable
terror. All the windows were smashed to atoms, the furni-
ture and fixtures in the interior were rattled, and some lighter
articles disturbed from their position. The suddenness of the
alarm, and the darkness of the night, coupled with an in-
definite idea as to the nature and extent of the explosion,
made the occupants of the house afraid to stir, and it was not
until some servants living adjacent arrived that the con-
sternation caused in the household subsided sufficiently to
enable them to examine the house, and judge of the narrow
escape they had had from a violent and horrible death.'
The consternation most decidedly did not spread to
the master and mistress of the establishment. The Kerry
Sentinel quickly had an allusion to ' a report that Mr.
Hussey turned into bed after the outrage with one of his
laconic jokes — that he should be called when the next ex-
plosion occurred.'
As a matter of fact what I did say was : —
* My dear, we can have a quiet night at last, for the
scoundrels won't bother us again before breakfast.'
And I can solemnly testify that within ten minutes of that
observation I was fast asleep, and never woke till I was
called.
THE EDENBURN OUTRAGE 241
But perhaps the best impression of what occurred can be
obtained from the recollection of my daughter Florence,
now Mrs. Nicoll, who was an inmate of Edenburn at the
time.
' I was awakened by a terrific noise, which to my sleepy
wits conveyed the impression that the roof had fallen in. It
was then between three and four in the morning. I lit a
candle and ran out into the passage where were congregat-
ing my family in night attire. My father was perfectly
calm.
' " Dynamite and badly managed," was his laconic explana-
tion. We all asked each other if we were hurt, and began
to be alarmed about my brother John, who, however, put in
an appearance in a singularly attenuated nightshirt, with a
candle in one hand and a revolver in the other, with which
he was rubbing his sleepy eyes.
* " Singular time of night, John, to try chemical experiments
without our permission, is it not } " said my father.
' Then John and my mother went downstairs to inspect
the premises ; of the back windows, thirty-four in number,
there was not a bit of glass as big as a threepenny piece left.
Our brougham was in the yard ; the window next the ex-
plosion was intact, but the one on the further side was blown
to smithereens.
' The servants were very scared, and one maid having
rushed straight to a sitting-room, was there found hysterically
embracing a sofa cushion.
' We received one odd claim for compensation. An
old woman living half a mile off complained that the force
of the explosion had knocked some of the plaster off
the wall, and that it had fallen into a pan full of milk,
spoiling it.
Q
242 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
' Whilst we were all chattering about the outrage, father
said : —
' " Don't be uneasy about a mere dynamite explosion ; it 's
like an Irishman's pig, you want it to go one way and it
invariably goes in the other."
' And with that he went off to bed again, with the remark
about having a quiet night which he has mentioned earlier in
this chapter.
' The only other thing which I now recall is, that a detach-
ment of the Buffs in the neighbourhood had found us the
only people to entertain them.
* On being told that Edenburn had been blown up, one of
them said : —
' *' They were the only neighbours we had to talk to, and
the brutes would not leave us them as a convenience." '
The Cork correspondent of the Times wrote : —
' Among the general body of the people of Kerry, the
news of the attempt to blow up Mr. Hussey's house at
Edenburn caused comparatively little excitement. In the
County Club at Tralee, the announcement was received with
something like a panic. Hitherto, persons who considered
themselves in danger were careful to be within their homes
before darkness had set in, and when going abroad had a
following of police for their protection. Now it is shown
that their houses may prove but a sorry shelter, even when
a protective force of police is about, and it is no wonder that,
with the terrible example furnished in this instance of the
daring of those who commit foul crimes, the class against
whom the outrages are directed should be filled with fears for
the future. The people generally show but small interest in
the occurrence.
' The attempt to blow up Mr. Hussey's dwelling is the
THE EDENBURN OUTRAGE 243
first of its kind in Kerry, and the third that has been
made in Ireland. Within the past few years the districts
of Castleisland and Tralee have been distinguished for the
number and ferocity of the outrages that were committed
there.'
I am also tempted to quote from the ' Leader ' in the
Times on the outrage : —
' Mr. Hussey has a reputation, not confined to Ireland,
as an able, fearless, and vigorous land agent, the best type of
a much abused class of men who have endured contumely
and faced dangers, by day and night, in order to protect the
rights of property intrusted to them.
* It appears that, owing to the disturbed state of the locality,
he intended to leave it for the winter ; and this probably
being known to his enemies, they made an effort to destroy
him before he got beyond their reach. He, at all events,
seems to have been under the spell of no pleasing illusion as
to the supposed tranquillity and the reign of order. On the
contrary, he is alleged to have stated that more outrages
than ever are committed, and that but for the deterrent force
employed by the Government, there would be no living in
the country. . . . This is the opinion of the majority of
Englishmen. They are not all satisfied that the spirit of
lawlessness and disorder is rooted out ; and they will find
only too strong confirmation of their doubts in the reckless
violence of the National Press, and in the attempt — marked
by novel features of atrocity — to destroy Mr. Hussey's house-
hold.'
As for the National Press, it indulged in an ecstasy of
enthusiasm over the perpetration, combined with intense
disgust ' at the miscarriage of justice ' of my having escaped
without hurt or more than very temporary inconvenience.
244 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
On my departure, one eloquent writer compared me to
* Macduff taking his babes and bandboxes to England,' a
choice simile I have always appreciated.
The United Ireland of December 6, 1884, i^ ^
characteristic leaderette, headed ' A very suspicious affair,'
observes : —
' We should like to know by what right the newspapers
speak of the affair as " a dynamite outrage " ? A very curious
surmise has been put forward locally, namely, that the house
had been stricken by lightning. The shattering of a building
by lightning is by no means phenomenal, and the absence of
all trace of any terrestrial explosive agency, gives colour to
the hypothesis that the destruction was due to meteorological
causes.'
With one last quotation I cease to draw upon what may be
termed outside contributions, and it is one which gratified me
at the time.
It is taken from the Cork Examiner of December 12,
1884:—
' Dear Sir, — Authoritative statements having been made
in the Press and elsewhere, that some persons living in
Mr. Hussey's immediate neighbourhood must have been
the perpetrators of the horrible outrage, or, at least, must
have given active and guilty assistance to the principal parties
concerned in it ; now we, the undersigned, tenants on the
property, and living in the closest proximity to Edenburn
House and demesne, take this opportunity of declaring in
the most public and solemn manner that neither directly nor
indirectly, by word or deed, by counsel or approval, had we
any participation in the tragic disaster of November 28.
The relations hitherto existing between Mr. Hussey and us
have ever been of the most friendly character. As a landlord.
THE EDENBURN OUTRAGE 245
his dealings with us were such as gave unqualified satisfaction
and were marked by justice, impartiality, and very great in-
dulgence. As a neighbour he was extremely kind and
obliging, ready whenever applied to, to help us, as far as
he was able, in every difficulty or trial in which we might
be placed. The bare suspicion, therefore, of being ever so
remotely connected with the recent explosion, is, to us,
a source of the deepest pain, a suspicion we repudiate
with honest indignation. Furthermore, the singular charity,
benevolence, and amiability of Mrs. Hussey are long and
intimately known to us. We witness almost daily her bounti-
ful treatment of the poor, and tender care of the sick and
infirm. Her ears never refuse to listen with sympathy to
every tale of distress, nor will she hesitate with her own hands
to wash and dress the festering wounds and sores of those
who flock to her from all the surrounding parishes. With
such knowledge as this, we should indeed be worse than
fiends did we raise a hand against the Hussey family, or
engage in any enterprise that would necessitate their departure
from among us : —
' Richard Fitzgerald. Daniel Neill.
Denis Daly. John Daly.
John Reynolds. Thomas Connor.
Cornelius Daly. Jeremiah Connor.
William Hogan. Thomas Shanahen.
Darby Leary. Michael Moynihar.
John Mason. Widow Aherne.
Jeremiah Dinan. James O'Sullivan.
J. O'Connell. John M'Elligott.
John Neligan. Henry Gentleman.'
As for those really concerned, people tell me that the
three implicated in the dynamite business are all dead in
246 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
America, and if the information is accurate no local person
was connected with the explosion, though the miscreants were,
of course, housed in the immediate vicinity.
There was one delicious incident.
The local branch of the Land League at Castleisland
refused to pay any reward to the dynamiters because we
had not been killed, and the leading miscreant actually fired
at the treasurer. Eventually the passages to America of
all the triumvirate were paid, and they thought it discreet
to quit the country, cursing their own stingy executive even
more deeply than they blasphemed against the Law and
execrated me.
A man from the neighbourhood subsequently wrote to
me from London that he could tell me who perpetrated
the Edenburn outrage.
I told him to call on me at the Union Club, of which
I was then a member, and informed him — his name was
O'Brien — I would arrange with the Home Office, in the
event of his information being valuable, that he should get
a reward.
He replied that his life was in danger in London from
another Fenian.
I went to the Home Office and saw Mr. Jenkinson on
the subject. He asked me to send O'Brien down to him
and he would settle matters, adding that he had reason for
believing that the story of threats from another scoundrel
was true.
I saw O'Brien and told him to call on Mr. Jenkinson.
He answered that he would go, but he never did, and
Mr. Jenkinson subsequently told me that the Land League
scented he was going to prove a troublesome informer, so
they practically outbid the Government by paying O'Brien
THE EDENBURN OUTRAGE 247
a large sum, which was handed to him on the steamer as it
was starting for America.
From that time, until I have been recalling the incidents
of the explosion for this book, I have never given a thought
to the affair and not mentioned it half a dozen times in the
twenty years that have elapsed.
CHAPTER XXI
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES
I BROUGHT my family back to Kerry in the following summer,
and after I had rebuilt Edenburn I lived there until I gave it
to my elder son, who has it to this day and resides there in
peace.
Matters were very different to that state of idyllic
simplicity in the critical times on which I am still dwelling.
One night, while in London, I was at the House of
Commons, and the London correspondent of the Freeman^
being presumably extremely short of what he would term
* copy,' he proceeded to make observations about me after
this fashion : —
' Over here Mr. Hussey is something of a fish out of
water. It would be hazardous to say that if he was to begin
his career as an agent again he would eschew the system that
has made him famous, but his present frame of mind is
unquestionably one of doubt as to whether, after all, the
game was worth the candle.'
That young man will go far as a writer of fiction,
I received, among more pleasant welcomes on my return
to my native land, the following delightful blast of vitupera-
tion from the Irish Citizen, and beg to tender the unknown
author my profound thanks for the diversion his ink-slinging
afforded me : —
' Here is something about a man who ought to have been
248
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES 249
murdered any day since 1879 — indeed we don't know that he
should have been let live even up to that date, and as for his
family, their translation to the upper regions by means of a
simple charge of dynamite, which nobody of any sense or
importance would even think of condemning, has been most
unaccountably deferred to the present year. This man is
Mr. S. M. Hussey, the miasma of whose breath, according
to a well-informed murder organ in Dublin, poisons one-half
of the kingdom of Kerry. Let any man read the speeches
delivered in Upper Sackville Street, and the articles in United
Ireland against Mr. Hussey, and he must ask why the fiend
incarnate has not been murdered long since. The infamy
of persistently turning hatred on a man like Mr. Hussey,
and then escaping the consequences of having thereby murdered
him, has no parallel in any country in the world. Inciting
to murder is practically reduced to a science in Ireland.
That Mr. Hussey has not been murdered years ago is
not the fault of the scientist, but the watchfulness of the
police.'
My experience while in England had been that few people
I met really appreciated what boycotting was like, so how are
my readers of twenty years afterwards to do so } Yet when
I went back to Ireland, it seemed to me even more cruel
than when I had grown comparatively accustomed by sheer
proximity to it.
Mr. Parnell had himself given the order in a public
speech : —
' Shun the man who bids for a farm from which a tenant
has been evicted, shun him in the street, in the shop, in the
marketplace, even in the place of worship, as if he were a
leper of old.'
This was done with the thoroughness which characterises
2 50 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Irishmen when back-sliding into unimaginable cruelties.
Should a boycotted man enter chapel, the whole congrega-
tion rose as with one accord and left him alone in the
building. Considering the sensitive and pious disposition
of the average Irishman, such ostracism was even more
poignant than it would be to an Englishman.
Only two families in Kerry, possibly in Munster, at
Christmas 1885, had the courage to resist the National
League police, commonly called moonlighters. These two
were the Curtins and the Doyles. The Curtins had to be
under constant police protection, were insulted wherever they
went, and their murdered father was openly called ' the
murderer.' As for the Doyles, the Board of Guardians
was urged to harass his unfortunate children, who were both
deaf and dumb.
The same Board of Guardians was most lavish in its
relief to any man evicted for declining to pay his rent.
In one case they gave a man fifteen shillings a week — or
treble the ordinary out-of-door relief — for over six years.
Sir James Stephen, a man of acute discriminations, who
has done more justice to the Irish problem than any one else,
wrote : —
'The great difficulty the Land League and the National
League have had to contend with is that of hindering the
neighbouring farmers, peasants, and labourers from frustrating
the strike against rent by taking up vacant farms, however
they came to be vacant. Boycotting never succeeded unless
crime was at its back. The Crimes Act cut the ground from
under the feet of the boycotters, not so much by its direct
prohibitions of the practice as by making it unsafe to commit
outrages in enforcing the law of the League. The Land
League and the National League were nothing else but screens
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES 251
for secret societies whose work was to enforce the League
decrees by outrage and murder.'
Whenever the ' History of Modern Ireland ' comes to
be written, that glowing outburst of truth ought to be
quoted.
There were some evictions carried out at Farranfore on
the estate of Lord Kenmare, by the sub-sheriff, Mr. Harnett,
and a force of military and police numbering about one
hundred and thirty.
During the eviction of one Daly, horns were blown and
the chapel bell set ringing. These appeals drew about three
thousand people to the place, who groaned and threw some
stones, besides growing so menacing that the Riot Act had to
be read, upon which the whole crowd moved off.
This brought a characteristic effusion from United
Ireland : —
' We remember the time when Kerry was a county as
quiet as the grave, when its member, Henry A. Herbert,
in the debate on the Westminster Act of 1871, was able to
rise in his place and boast that in purely Celtic counties like
his there was no crime, and that agrarian outrages was con-
fined to districts infused with English blood, like Meath and
Tipperary. What has changed it ^ Principally the mal-
practices of a couple of agents ruling over half its area,
whose bloated rentals grow swollen under their hands with
the sweat of dumb and hopeless possessors.'
Whatever else he possessed, that writer had not one
vestige of truth with which to cover the indecency of his
misrepresentations.
He did not mention that Mr. Matthew Harris, a Member
for Galway, had publicly observed that if the tenant farmers
of Ireland shot down landlords as partridges are shot in
252 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
the month of September, he would never say a word against
them.
It is a fact that the convulsion of horror at the murder
of Lord Frederick Cavendish alone prevented an organised
campaign for the ' removal ' of Irish landlords on a systematic
and wholesale scale.
By the way, according to his son, it was quite by chance
that Professor MahafFy — that illustrious ornament of Trinity
College — was not also murdered. He had intended to walk
over with poor Mr. Burke after the entry of the Viceroy and
Chief Secretary, but he was detained by an undergraduate
and so found it too late to catch the doomed victim before
he started. Had he walked with them, it is questionable if
the murderers would have attacked three men : on the
other hand, he might, of course, have been added to the
slain.
There was a meeting of Lord Kenmare's and Mr. Herbert
of Muckross's tenants at Killarney addressed by Mr. Sheehan,
M.P., who advised them, as the landlords refused 70 per cent,
only to offer 50 per cent., and nothing at all in March (1887),
as by that time the new Irish Parliament would have allotted
the land free to the present holders, without any compensation
to the landlords.
Despite the efforts of traitors on both sides of the Channel,
that Irish Parliament has not yet been summoned.
The parish priest, Mr. Sheehy, stopped the Limerick
hunting, and so took _^ 24,000 a year out of the pockets of
the very poor. That man did more harm than the landlords,
who alone gave the poor work, and there is no doubt that
many of the worst crimes were instigated and indirectly
suggested from the altar.
At this point I want to interpose with one word to the
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES 253
reader to beg him not to regard this as either a connected
narrative of crime, much less a regular essay with proper
deductions — the trimmings to the joint — but only a series of
observations as I recall events which impressed me, and which
I think may come home with some force to a happier genera-
tion that knew neither Parnelhsm nor crime. To write a
consecutive and connected history of these atrocities would be
to compile a volume of horrors. I prefer to give a few
recollections of outrages, and to let the direct simplicity of
these terrible reminiscences impress those who have bowels of
compassion.
A gentleman named Nield was killed in Mayo, simply
because he was mistaken for my son Maurice. This was in
broad daylight, in the town of Charlestown. It was raining
hard at the time — a thing so common in Ireland that no one
mentions it any more than they do the fact of the daily paper
appearing each morning — and the unfortunate victim had an
umbrella up, so the mob could not see his face. They shouted,
' Here 's Hussey,' and tried to pull him off the car, but the
parish priest stopped this. However, before he could reduce
the villains to the fear of the Church, which does affect them
more than the fear of the Law, they gave poor Nield a blow
on the head, and, though he lived for six months, he never
recovered.
Another time, when returning to his house in Mayo from
Ballyhaunis, on a dark night, my son Maurice found a wall
built, about eighteen inches high, across the road, for the
express purpose of upsetting him. It was only by the grace
of God — as they say in Kerry — and his own careful driving,
that he was preserved.
In those same Land League times, my son was a prominent
gentleman rider. At Abbeyfeale races he rode in a green jacket
254 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
and won the race, which produced a lot of enthusiasm, the
crowd not knowing who it was sporting the popular colour.
They only heard it was my son after he had left the course,
whereupon a mob rushed to the station, and the police had
to stand four deep outside the carriage window to protect him,
to say nothing of an extra guard at the station gates.
The cordiality of my fellow-countrymen also provided me
with another disturbed night at Aghadoe, which I had leased
from Lord Headley.
To quiet the apprehensions of my family, and also to
relieve the mind of the D.I, from anxiety about my tough
old self, there were always five police in the house, and two
on sentry duty all night.
On this particular date, about two o'clock in the morning,
we were aroused by hearing shots fired in the wood below the
house, the plan of the miscreants being to draw the police away
from the house. As this did not succeed, a second party began
a counter demonstration in another quarter. The theory is
that a third party wanted to approach the house from the back
in the temporary absence of the constabulary, and disseminate
the house, its contents, and the inhabitants into the air and the
immediate vicinity by the gentle and persuasive influence of
dynamite.
However, the police were not to be tricked, and soon the
fellows, having grown apprehensive, or having exhausted all
their ammunition, were heard driving off. Signs of blood
were found on the road towards Beaufort next morning, so
the attacking force suffered some inconvenience in return for
giving us a bad night.
Lord Morris, among a group of acquaintances in Dublin,
pointing to me, said : —
'That's the Jack Snipe who provided winter shootmg
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES 255
for the whole of Kerry, and not one of them could wing
him.'
' Mighty poor sport they got out of it,' I answered, ' and
I have an even worse opinion of their capacity for accurate
aiming than I have of their benevolent intentions.*
Other people know more of oneself than one does, and I
was much interested to hear that, in this year of grace, the
editor of the Daily 'Telegraph said of me : —
* Sam Hussey, yes, that 's the famous Irishman they used
to call " Woodcock " Hussey, because he was never hit,
though often shot at.'
I always thought ' Woodcock ' Garden had the monopoly
of the epithet, but am proud to find I infringed his patent.
I was benevolently commended by a vituperative ink-
slinger, Daniel O'Shea, in his letter to the Sunday democrat in
1886, but none of those he blackguarded were in the least
inconvenienced by ' the roll of his tongue,' as the saying is : —
* A vast number of the Irish have been heartlessly per-
secuted by the most despotic landlords of Ireland, such as
Lord Kenmare, Herbert, Headley, Hussey, Winn, and the
Marquis of Lansdowne, all of whom are EngUshmen by birth,
and consequently aliens in heart, despots by instinct, absentees
by inclination, and always in direct opposition to the cause of
Ireland. Poor-rate, town-rate, income-tax, are nothing less
than wholesale robbery, and is it any wonder that some of the
people who are thus oppressed should be driven to desperation }
It is deplorable to learn that they should have had any cause
to commit what are called " agrarian " crimes. Why not turn
their attention to these landlords, the police, the travelling
coercion magistrates, not forgetting the emergency men }
These are the people to whom I would direct the attention of
the men of Kerry.'
256 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
I have given a number of examples of how I have been
genially appreciated in the hostile Press, but my family are of
opinion that it would not be fair, considering how many kind
things were published in loyal journals, not to render some
tribute to them too. I was sincerely obliged when I received
a good word, but, frankly, ;the bad ones amused me much
more. However, I am not ungrateful, and I have specially
prized one able description of my attitude which appeared in
the Globe^ the manly strain of the writing of which is in healthy
contrast to the hysterical effusions tainted with adjectival
mania of those who wanted me shot, but were too cowardly to
fire at me themselves : —
' Mr. Hussey is admittedly fair and just in his deahngs
with his own tenants. But he is only just and fair, which, in
the ethics of Irish agrarianism, is equivalent to being a rack-
renter and a tyrant. He refuses to let his own land at what-
ever the tenants think well to pay for it. He persists, with
exasperating obstinacy, in refusing to sacrifice the interests of
the landlords for whom he acts. In short, Mr. Hussey is one
of the most determined and formidable obstacles to the success
of the Land League. While such men have the courage to
face the agrarian conspiracy, that grand consummation of
patriotic effort — the rooting out of landlordism — must be a
somewhat tough and tedious business. He has lived in the
midst of enemies, who would have murdered him if only they
had the opportunity. His life, it may be safely said, has had
no stronger security than his own ability to protect it.'
And yet some one ventured to call Irish land agents
' popularity-hunting scoundrels.'
' Popularity and getting in money were never on the same
bush,' as I told Lord Kenmare, and if I had stopped to think
how I should make myself popular, I should have bothered my
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES 257
head about what I did not care twopence for, and provided an
even more easy target for firing at at short range.
Drifting from a man who paid no heed to scoundrels, I
am led to allude to the attitude of a profession, the members of
which profited by their amenities — I, of course, mean solicitors
— because some one put a question to me on the subject only
the other day.
My answer is, that none of the solicitors were in the Land
League, and they did not instigate outrages ; but they drew
comfortable fees for defending the perpetrators.
Swindlers and murderers never agree, for they practise
distinct professions.
We were fighting a Land War, and though I have kept
back land questions as much as I can, in order not to weary
the reader with what never wearies me, I have one or two
examples to give which cannot be omitted if I am to portray
the true facts.
My firm was agent for an estate in Castleisland, the rent of
which, in 1841, was ^2300. I exhibited the rental, showing
only three quarters in arrear. By 1886 it was cut down by the
Commissioners to ;^i8oo, and the landlord sold it for ^30,000,
for which the tenants used to pay four per cent, for forty-nine
years, to cover principal and interest.
There was a tenant on that estate named Dennis Coffey.
He took a farm at ^105 a year ; the Commissioners reduced
that rent to ;^8o. He purchased it for ;^I440 — eighteen
years' purchase, for which his son has ^42 a year for forty-
nine years. The'father had purchased a farm for fee-simple
of equal value for ^3000, which he left to two others of his
sons. So that one son, by paying half what he had covenanted
to pay, and which he could pay, gets a farm equal in value to
what his father paid /I3000 in hard cash for. The man who
R
258 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
is paying rent has his farm well stocked ; the others are
paupers, and one died in the poorhouse.
That may belong to to-day, and not to the period of out-
rage with which I have been dealing ; but it duly points the
moral, and is the outcome of those times.
At the Boyle Board of Guardians in 1887, upon a discus-
sion over the Kilronan threatened evictions, Mr. Stuart said : —
' There was one of these men arrested by the police. His
rent was _^4, 12s. 6d., and, when arrested, a deposit-receipt
for £110 was found in his pocket.'
This case had been freely cited at home and in America
as a typical instance of the ruthless tyranny of Irish landlords.
My friend and neighbour, Mr. Arthur Blennerhassett,
addressed the following letter to Mr. W. E. Gladstone, then
Prime Minister : —
< Sir — I beg respectfully to call your attention to the
following statement. In 1866, Judge Longfield conveyed to
my uncle, under what was called an indefeasible title, the
lands of Inch East, Ardroe and Inch Island, and previous to
the sale, Judge Longfield caused them to be valued by Messrs,
Gadstone and Ellis, and in the face of the rental, he certified
that the fair letting value of Inch East and Ardroe was £120,
and that the fair letting value of Inch Island was £ys, now in
hand. On the strength of will, my uncle purchased the lands
valued at ;^305 for ^^6200, and your sub-Commissioners have
just reduced the rental of Inch East and Ardroe at the rate of
from ^230 to ^170 a year.
I therefore request you will be pleased to take some steps
to recoup me for the £60 ^ year I have lost by the action of
the Government, and I may say this can be partially done by
abandoning the quit rent and tithe rent charge, amounting to
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES 259
^34, 5s. 4d., which I am now forced by the Government to
pay without any reduction. A. Blennerhassett.'
The Right Honourable W. E. Gladstone.
The oracle of Hawarden was as dumb to this as to my
effusion to a similar purport already mentioned. Not even
the proverbial postcard was sent to Tralee, so the verbosity
of Mr. Gladstone was strangely checked when he found him-
self pinned down to facts by Irish landlords.
Whilst landlords and their families were literally starving,
and agents were collecting what they could at the peril of their
lives, the real land-grabbers, the no-renters, were accumulating
money, and investing it in land.
I sent the following series of sales to the Times to show the
real value of land : —
(i) The interest on Lord Granard's estate, the valuation
of which was five guineas, was sold for ^280, and the fee-
simple subsequently bought for ^^80.
(2) On one of his own farms for which the tenant paid
^65 annual rent, the tenant's interest fetched ^^750 and
auction fees.
(3) A farm at Curraghila, near Tralee, annual rent ^'jo.
Poor Law valuation, ^51, los., area stat. 73 acres. The
tenant's interest was sold for ;i^700.
(4) Tenant's interest on a farm in County Tipperary, on
Lord Normanton's estate, at yearly rent of ;^30, was sold
for £6oOy and the fee-simple purchased for ;^450,
(5) Tenant's interest at Breaing, near Castleisland, held at
the annual rent of ^51, los., was sold for £S5'^-
(6) At Abbeyfeale, County Kerry, tenant of a small farm,
at annual rent of twenty-four shillings, sold his interest for
£ss-
2 6o REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
All the sales, save the Tipperary one, were in a district in
which, prior to the Land Act of i 88 1, tenant-right was unknown.
Poetry is always congenial to an Irishman, probably because
it has licences almost as great as he likes to take, and has a
vague, irresponsible way of putting things, much akin to his
own methods.
Here are some lines from the ' Irish Tenant's Song ' which
express a good deal of the popular emotion : —
Oh, Parnell, dear, and did you hear the news that's going round ?
The landlords are forbid by law to live on Irish ground.
No more their rent-days they may keep, nor agents harsh distrain,
The widow need no longer weep, for over is their reign.
I met with mighty Gladstone, and he took me by the hand.
And he said, ' Hurrah for Ireland ! 'tis now the happy land.
'Tis a most delightful country that I for you have made —
You may shoot the landlord through the head who asks that rent be
paid.'
We care not for the agent, nor do we care for those
Who come upon us to distrain — we pay them back in blows.
And when hopeless, helpless, ruined, these landlords vile shall roam.
We'll hunt and hound them from the roofs they've held so long as
home.
I don't say that was sung in Castleisland, but it might
have been the local hymn and verbal companion to the brutal
misdeeds of the benighted inhabitants.
. As if matters were not bad enough, that Apostle of out-
rage Mr. Michael Davitt came to Castleisland on February 2 1 ,
1886, and in a pestilential speech, inciting to crime, he showed
that, at all events, he appreciated that for sheer blackness and
turpitude Kerry was bad to beat. He said : —
' For some time past Kerry has attracted more attention
for the occurrences which have been taking place here, than
the whole remainder of Ireland put together. I am not
without hope that henceforth, until the battle with land-
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES 261
lordism and Dublin Castle is triumphantly over, the people
of Kerry will be towers of strength to the national cause.
The hope of Irish landlordism is now centred in Kerry.
Elsewhere it has none, it is a social rinderpest, since the
National League was started 1600 families have been turned
out in this one county.'
Captain M'Calmont in the House of Commons, three weeks
afterwards, called attention to Mr. Baron Dowse's address to
the Grand Jury of the County of Kerry in which he stated : —
' That this county is in a very much worse state than it
has been for years : that there are no less than three hundred
offences specially reported to the constabulary since the Assizes
of 1885, consisting of two cases of murder, eighteen cases of
letters threatening to murder, thirty-nine cases of cattle,
horse, and sheep stealing, eleven cases of arson, eighteen cases
of maiming cattle, fifty-two cases of seizing arms, seventy-
four cases of sending threatening letters, and twenty-four
cases of intimidation.'
You will observe that this is the same picture from two
different points of view.
Almost the worst case in which I was personally interested,
was that of the Cruickshank family.
The father, an industrious, respectable, elderly Scotsman,
supported his family at Inch by the proceeds of a rabbit-
warren which he rented. He had no farm, and therefore
might expect to live in peace, even in Kerry, in those times ;
but, as he was a Scotch Protestant, and had arms, he was a
marked man.
Having been threatened, he was partially guarded by the
police who patrolled the district. However, in April 1885,
when the Prince of Wales visited Ireland, and the constabulary
from country districts were drafted into the towns through
262 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
which he had to pass, a number of disguised Nationalists
entered Cruickshank's house at night. They gave him a
frightful beating, even breaking a gun on his head, which was
seriously injured. This was done in the presence of his wife
and daughters, and of a young son who, with one of his
sisters, went off in the night to a police station four miles
distant, to obtain assistance for his father.
Between the fight and the chill received that night, the
boy fell into a decline of which he died in May 1886. One
daughter, not strong at the time of the outrage, became a
chronic invalid. The father, as soon as he was able to move
after the perpetration, applied for compensation under the
Crimes Act, but as it was then to expire in about a fortnight,
the Lord-Lieutenant refused to consider the case. The poor
fellow continued to suffer from the wounds on his head, and
so affected was he by the shock of his son's death, that
he became insensible and only survived him a few weeks,
leaving his widow and three daughters without any means
of support.
My wife and the former Archdeacon of Ardfert appealed
for subscriptions and obtained ^120, which enabled the un-
fortunate survivors to return to Scotland.
That was the settlement of the land question that suited
the Nationalists, namely, to cause the death of the head of
the family, and to get the rest out of the country. It did
not say much for the civilisation of the nineteenth century,
but after the brutalities of the spring of 187 1 in Paris, there
can be no doubt how thin is the veneer over the barbarity
of even the most civilised ; those deeds were perpetrated in
the heart of the European capital specially devoted to amuse-
ment : what I describe took place in the most distant portion
of Europe, where Nature is lovely and man, alas, the creature
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES 263
of impulse, the prey of those who lead him into the worst
temptations.
Another settlement was suggested by an anonymous writer
who concealed his identity under the pseudonym of Saxon.
He observed : —
'Two hundred millions of English money are now (1886)
to be spent buying out Irish landlords, but would it not be
surely better and more in accordance with reason and justice
to buy out the tenants? At a very low calculation, two
hundred millions would put a couple of hundred pounds in
every Irishman's pocket, and there is not one of them that
would refuse to leave his beloved country, and bless America
or Australia on these terms. The island could be populated
with Scotch and English settlers, and our difficulties be at
an end. The Irish must not have their own loaf and ours too.
I commend this scheme to Messrs. Gladstone and Morley.
It is quite as just, quite as reasonable, and more forcible than
their own.'
Hear, hear ! say I, but our grandchildren's grandchildren
when grey old men will still be trying to settle the Irish
question, which can never be settled until there arises a big
man strong enough to force his will on the Empire and
fortunate enough to be able to hand over the reins of political
dictatorship to an equally enlightened and powerful successor.
It is hopeless to expect Irish matters to go well, when
the balance of parties in the House of Commons is held by
hirelings and traitors, men who debase patriotism and would
to-day encourage outrage as much as they did in 1884, if it
was worth their mercenary while.
I had a word to write myself a year later to Mr. T.
Harrington, who thought he could tell as many lies about
me as suited his own purpose, and I addressed my reply,
264 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
published on August 29, 1887, to the Editor of the Times.
It ran as follows : —
' Sir — I have just read the speech of Mr. T. Harrington
in the debate on Mr. Gladstone's motive relating to the pro-
clamation of the National League, in which he states that I
invented and gave to Mr. Balfour the particulars of the boy-
cotting of Justin M'Carthy, I beg you will allow me to
state that I never wrote to Mr. Balfour, or to any member of
the Government, on that or any subject. Had I supplied the
information, I would have mentioned some facts which Mr.
Balfour omitted, for instance, that a man named Andrew
Griffin was nearly murdered because he brought provisions to
Justin M'Carthy, that four men were put on their trial for
the outrage, but notwithstanding a plain charge from the
judge, the jury, fearing the vengeance of the League, acquitted
the prisoners. I would also mention a fact that would seem
almost incredible to your English Catholic readers, that the
old man cannot attend his place of worship without being
hissed at in the church, and that his aged wife, while partaking
of the sacrament of the Holy Communion, was hissed at and
jeered. These things can be proved on oath, and are not to
be set aside by frothy declamation. Neither can the fact be
disproved that one of the offences for which Justin M'Carthy
has suffered was that he purchased his farm from me under
Lord Ashbourne's Act, a proceeding which (as it is likely to
settle aown the country) is considered a deadly crime ; and
for committing the same offence another man in the same
barony had his cows stabbed.
Your obedient servant,
S. M. HUSSEY.'
There is yet another case I cannot forbear from handing
on to a generation that knows no outrages nearer home than
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES 265
Macedonia. Six ruffians, having their faces covered with
handkerchiefs, and armed with heavy cudgels, entered the
house of a farmer named Lambe and began to beat him. To
save his head from the blows, he ran the upper part of his
body up the chimney and held on by the cross-bar. His wife,
on coming to his assistance, was beaten so severely that her
skull was fractured, while an aged female — stated to be in her
ninety-seventh year — was not only roughly handled, but also
beaten. A most discreditable episode indeed, in a land
formerly renowned for respect for womanhood, and for the
warm-hearted generosity of her sons.
In only one instance in Kerry was police protection being
regarded as necessary up to the present summer, and all who
know the contemporary condition of affairs will at once re-
collect that Mrs. Morrogh Bernard is the lady in question.
The late Mr. Edward Morrogh Bernard of Fahagh Court,
Bullybrack, was a Roman Catholic, who had resided in Kerry
all his life, and some five-and-twenty years ago he built on
his property the residence in which he died in the spring of
1904. He and his wife, an English lady, who was jusdy
beloved for her wide charity, were one night, after dinner,
sitting in their drawing-room, when a party of masked moon-
lighters walked in. One of them held a pistol to her head,
and told her not to scream or move, else he would shoot
her. Another performed the same kindly office for Mr.
Bernard, whilst the rest ransacked the house for arms and
money.
Mrs. Bernard noticed that the hands of the man who was
threatening her with violence were not those of an agricultural
labourer, because they were small and white. On the strength
of this clue, the police arrested a little tailor in the village,
and she courageously identified him in court, though every
266 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
possible pressure was brought on her not to do so. He was
sentenced to several years' imprisonment, and his friends
vowed they would make it hot for Mrs. Bernard, and ever
after she has been protected by two or three constables.
The police did not live in Fahagh Court, but in a hut specially
built for them a few yards off, and at night they always came
into the house. To the very last days of Mr, Bernard's life
whenever he and she went to pay a call on a neighbour, two
policemen followed them either on a car or on bicycles,
and I have never heard any reasons advanced to show that
these precautions were superfluous.
Meeting this little party on the highway was the only
thing in the twentieth century which brought home to the
British tourist the terrible deeds which blackened Kerry in
the eighties.
I have always looked on the light side of life, even when
it has seemed blackest, and so I will not close this chapter
without a more cheery anecdote.
There was a good deal of friction among Land Leaguers
over the amount of relief money and other remuneration
doled out by the rebel authorities. This seldom reached a
more droll pitch than in the complaint of a girl at Rossbeigh,
who wrote to a prominent member of Parliament — since
deceased — that another girl had been awarded a pound for
booing at a sergeant, ' while I, who broke a policeman's head,
never got so much as would pay for a candle to the Blessed
Virgin,'
Sometimes the crafty Paddy utilised the agitation for his
own purposes, as the following example will prove.
A farmer's house was fired into, but no one could tell the
reason why, for he had not paid any rent and was a good Land
Leaguer. He was asked if he could account for it himself, and
MORE ATROCITIES AND LAND CRIMES 267
after some shuffling under promise of strict secrecy, made the
following revelation.
' Well, it was this way, I married a dacent girl from the
North, and all went well with us until her mother came along,
and she had the divil's own tongue, and nothing could get
her out of the house. I would say "the North has fine air,
would not a change back there get you your health? "
' To which the old Biddy would reply : —
' " Where would I live except with my only daughter and
her husband .'' "
'And this sort of thing made me desperate, and I promised
the " bhoys " five shillings if they would fire round the house
on a certain night. On the evening that had been agreed
upon, I began reading on the paper how farms in Castleisland
were being fired into, and the old woman said that if these
things were so, County Kerry was worse than County Cork,
and I thought to myself " maybe you '11 find it so, you ould
divil."
' Well, they came and did their work in grand style after
we had gone to bed, and there was the mother-in-law screech-
ing and bawling, and every hour too long for her until daylight,
when I put her in the cart and drove her to the station.'
The sequel is that the couple left to themselves lived
happily ever after, a thing more likely to happen to people in
England and Ireland, if it was no one's business to make bad
blood between them.
CHAPTER XXII
COMMISSIONS
I HAVE probably given evidence to as many Commissions as
any living man, for I have been before seven, and never once
was asked a question that posed me.
I enjoyed the experience of being asked about what I
knew by those who knew nothing on the subject, and if
the legal mind was a little more obtuse than the civil, well,
it was only the choice between a grey donkey and a black.
The earliest Commission I gave evidence before was one
on Agriculture. Professor Bohnamy Price was one of the
Commissioners, and he knew what he was talking about,
others being Lord Carlingford, the Duke of Buccleuch, and
the Duke of Richmond and Gordon, who presided. The
peers were all used to big parks, obsequious bailiffs, and
huge demesnes. I think they metaphorically picked up
their coat tails and stepped carefully away from the Irish
potato patches and acres of turf.
It was alleged that prosperity of nations was a good deal
owing to tenant-right.
' I do not think so,' said I, ' because Donegal and Kerry
have approximately the same value and area, same number of
miles of road and sea frontage. There is extreme tenant-
right in Donegal and none in Kerry, yet the prosperity
of the farmers in Kerry is extremely superior to those of
Donegal.'
268
COMMISSIONS 269
' There is too much tenant-right in Donegal,' said
Mr. Chichester Fortescue, who was examining me.
' Not if it is a good thing,' I replied, ' for then you could
not have too much.'
Mr. Shaw Lefevre's Commission on the housing of the
working classes in Ireland was very uninteresting. ' Oxen
are stalled, pigs are styed or take possession of the cabin,
but what is done for the Irish labourers .? ' asked a passionate
mob-orator, and in many cases it might have been answered
that a good deal more has been done for them than the idle
ruffians deserve. I had no difficulty in showing that landlords
were always willing to give assistance in housing labourers, and
when an ex-mayor of Cork on the Commission seemed to
doubt my assertions, I might have retorted that though he was
used to factory hands, yet he had never bothered himself how
they lived out of work time.
The Duke of Devonshire was on this board. He has
obtained his great and honourable reputation by conscientiously
slumbering through many duties. His tastes are for racing
and shooting, but from sheer patriotism he has devoted himself
to politics with all the energy of his lethargic manner, which
successfully conceals abnormal common-sense. It was he, more
than any other man, who saved Ireland from Home Rule,
though as an Irish landlord he has not come much to the fore,
because his vast English estates are immeasurably more im-
portant than those situated round Lismore. This picturesque
town was once called the abode of saints, but only antiquarians
remember that its university was once so important that Alfred
the Great went there to study, and that in the old castle
Henry 11. held a Parliament. The Cavendishs rebuilt the
latter, and both in appearance and position it much resembles
Warwick Castle. It has not very many bedrooms, and when
270 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
the King was first expected, among various extensive altera-
tions, a bathroom was put up. The Duke has generally visited
Lismore twice a year, and has never stood unduly on his dignity,
but been approachable by all, and reasonable about everything,
which has also been characteristic of his political views.
Lord Bessborough presided over a Commission on Irish
Land Laws. He was a very kind, very lean man, who was
wont in old age to walk about London wrapped in a black
cape, and was idolised at Harrow, where twenty generations
of boys knew him and his brothers and valued their unabated
interest in school cricket. Baron Dowse, a judge I have
already mentioned, the O'Conor Don, and Mr. Shaw, were
the members who put questions to me. I remember the
O'Conor Don was much impressed when I mentioned I had
made six tours in Scotland, and had been in Holland, in
Belgium, in France, in Germany, in Italy, and just before
in Spain, to inquire into the state of agriculture. I said
that if a man persisted in farming badly I would serve him
with notice to quit even if he paid his rent, and I pointed
out that there were three hundred thousand occupiers of land
in Ireland whose holdings were under ^^8 Poor Law valuation,
and these occupiers, when their potatoes fail, have nothing to
fall back upon but relief work, starvation, or emigration, and
I further laid before the Commission a purchase scheme.
There would be twenty years' purchase-money to be lent by
the State, two years' purchase to be found by the tenant and
two years more at the end of ten years. Thus the landlord
would get a price for his property that would induce him
to sell (reductions had not then been wholesale) and the
tenant would get a lease for ever with abolition of rent at
the end of thirty-five years by paying a fine of two years'
rent down and two more at the end of ten years.
COMMISSIONS 271
They would not have it. Who ever expected that Justice
would lift the bandage from her eyes for the sake of fair play
to the landlord ?
Lord Salisbury had a Commission on the working of the
Land Act of 188 1. Lord Dunraven, Lord Pembroke, and
Lord Cairns were on it, the latter being chairman. He was so
austere that, when he was made Lord Chancellor, it was said
he had swallowed the mace and could not digest it. His law
may have been profound, but it was never relieved by a gleam
of humour, and his ecclesiastical proclivities were of the lowest
Church type. For some time he nominated Tory bishops,
and it was declared he was so evangelical that he would have
suggested any clergyman for a vacant bishopric who promised
to forego the ecclesiastical gaiters. His horror of Anthony
Trollope's novels was notorious, especially his dislike of
Mrs. Proudie and her attendant divines.
I said the working of the Land Act was ruin to Irish
landlords, and cited a case. A Kerry gentleman had an estate
of j^ 1 200 rent roll, with a mortgage of ^^ 8000 which involved
charges of ^400 a year, a jointure tithes and head rent took
j^400 more. The Commissioners by so cutting down the rent
by ;^400 made a clean sweep of what that landlord had to live
on. Fortunately, he had his mother's fortune of ^40,000,
which his grandfather had wisely provided should not be in-
vested in Irish lands, having, in fact, established a contingency
in case his grandson should be dispossessed of the property
he had held for generations, by a Government truckling to
blustering ' no-renters.'
Before Lord Cowper's Commission on the same subject,
I said much the same thing over again and realised that
Royal Commissions are most valuable for the purpose of
shelving pregnant topics. The only good derived from
272 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
these official inquiries is that the witnesses get their expenses
and the Government printers have a lucrative contract.
There is a story told of a witness who was being brought
over to London to give evidence.
' Patrick,' said the priest, ' you '11 be having to mind what
you 're saying over there. Perjury won't help you no more
than I can, my poor fellow.'
' What happens if I get a bit wide of the truth then,
father .? '
' You won't get your expenses, my son.'
' Holy Mother, to think of that ! I '11 be so careful that
I won't know how many legs the blessed pig has that 's round
the cabin all day long.'
Sir Edward Fry's Commission had none of the tinsel of
big names nor the tawdriness of aristocratic apathy. Sir
Edward meant to find the truth, and so did his colleagues
— all practical men. What they did was to strike against
the hard rock of party government which was too adamant
to receive the evidence sown by these gardeners. Dr. Anthony
Traill, who was one of the Commissioners, has in this very
year of grace been made Provost of Trinity, and from what
I saw of him I am certain he will be the apostle of fair play
between undergraduates and dons.
I answered over five hundred questions and rammed home
one or two points. For instance, I expressed my disapproval
of a system by which a man who is a sub-Commissioner at the
hearing on the first term may become the Court valuer on
the next.
In valuation, it is wrong that men from the north should
be sent to value in the south, or vice versa ^ and to prove that
I cited the example of my tenant, Anne Delane. Her rent
was fixed first term in 1883 for ;^34, 10s. In 1896, for
COMMISSIONS 273
second term, the sub-Commissioner fixed it at ^^23, los., and
on appeal it was raised to ^25. Mr. O'Shaughnessy, who was
one of the sub-Commissioners on the first term, acted as a
Court valuer on the second. On the first time he allowed
^^103, 6s. gd. for drains and buildings, and on the second
omitted it.
In the case of Hoffman, who held a farm at a rent of ^30,
I reduced it to ^20 in 188 1. In 1896 he went into court, and
the County Court judge reduced it to ^^15, and on appeal he
got it again reduced to _^ 1 3 .
On land which came into my own hands after 1881,
I was able to get rents over 50 per cent, in excess of those
fixed by the sub-Commissioners. In the case of Patrick
Quill, the farm on which the rent was cut down from ^20
to j^i6 was sold for ;^300 with a charge of ^9 on it.
In the case of Michael Callaghan, Colonel Hickson ex-
pended ;^300 and Callaghan ;^ioo on the farm, for which the
rent was ;^70, and he sold his interest for ;^700.
This perpetual wrangling and litigation is ruinous, for
every man is farming down his land and letting it deteriorate
as fast as he can ; and there is a most marked difference in
the county between those who have bought their land and
those who are tenants. When a judicial rent was fixed and
a tenant came into Court for a second judicial rent, I
think the landlord should have been at liberty to stop him
by tendering the farmer twenty years' purchase ; that would
give him a reduction of 20 per cent, and make him a
proprietor in the course of time.
In 1850 at Milltown Fair, yearlings were selling for 30s.
apiece. The same cattle now are selling for ^^5, and Kerry is
a great stock-breeding country.
It is very hard to define a landlord, and you will hear
s
274 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
of some being landlords who do not get a shilling from their
estates. Under these circumstances they would be like the
fox in iEsop's fable who had lost his own tail.
To show how the Land Act works, on the Harenc estate
I was offered twenty-seven years' purchase before the Act for
a holding, and at the time of the Commission they offered me
sixteen years' purchase on two-thirds of the rent.
One other Commission besides that of the Times remains
to be mentioned. Lord Balfour of Burleigh, a dour Scot with
a lot of gumption in his head, was chairman of one on Imperial
versus local taxation. My easy task was to show the excess of
the latter in Kerry, which is the highest taxed county in the
three kingdoms.
When a man thinks of the vast amount of information
buried beyond all probable excavation in the Blue Books of
the last fifty years, he may well break into Carlyle-like
diatribes against the waste of the whole thing — which is paid
for out of the taxpayer's pocket.
Alluding to all these Commissions reminds me that there
were three Land Commissioners — Mr. Bewlay, who was very
deaf ; Mr. FitzGerald, who was rather hasty ; and Mr.
Wrench, who consistently absented himself to attend the
Congested Board.
So they were respectively, though not respectfully, called,
' The judge who could not hear, the judge who would not
hear, and the judge who is not here.' This was one of the
witticisms of my clever friend, Mr. Robert Martin — 'Bally-
hooley ' — one of the very few men who can write a good Irish
song, and sing it well, into the bargain.
I appeared in the witness-box in the case of O'Donnell
V. the Times. I suppose people buy newspapers to obtain
information, or else to get a pennyworth of lies to induce
COMMISSIONS 275
equanimity in bearing the income-tax, the weather, and all
other ills that an unnatural Government is responsible for ;
and I further suppose a halfpenny paper has to condense its
inaccuracies, and serve them up in tabloid form for mental
indigestion. However, that is as it may be ; anyhow, I had a
hearty laugh at the Star^ which wrote : —
' A look round the Court again this morning brought the
strange impression which one now always feels on entering
the Court. The space is so comparatively small, but one
feels as though it were all Ireland in microcosm. You see
representatives of every class in the terrible conflict of war, of
rival passions, hatred, and traditions. This man with the
large nose, the large and disfigured face, is Mr. Hussey, and
those scars that you see, and the distortion of the features, are
perchance marks left by some desperate and homicidal tenant
avenging his wrongs.'
That ' perchance ' is good, considering my riding mis-
adventure in County Cork, of which I gave an account
earlier.
As for the Parnell Commission, it was the outcome of
superb patriotism on the part of the Times. That great
organ, in the spirit of purest devotion to the best interests
of England and Ireland, honestly attempted to expose
treachery, and to denounce treason. Hundreds of columns
of the valuable space at their daily disposal, as well as
thousands of pounds earned by the highest journalism of
any country, were freely lavished in this tremendous denuncia-
tion, known as ' Parnellism and Crime.' The crime of Pigott
eventually saved Parnell and his followers. But the last word
on that has not yet been spoken. Another pen than mine
may, perchance before long, tell the whole truth about that
tragic episode, and explain what is still an unsolved riddle in
276 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
all dispassionate minds. Without challenging and exciting
the strongest racial prejudices, it will be impossible to lift the
veil, and I have no intention of affording even the slightest
preliminary peep behind the scenes of tliat dramatic affair.
The wheels of God grind slowly, and they ground exceeding
small almost before the absurd exultation of Nationalist relief
over the Pigott episode had abated. It is almost time to treat
the whole affair from the historical point of view, and then the
idol of Home Rule will be pulverised. However, that is
another story in which I have no chapter to write.
My own share in the Parnell Commission was on November
29, 1888, on the twenty-third day. I was examined by the
Attorney-General, the present Lord Chief Justice, and the
most popular and most honourable of men. At that very
time, I have heard, he sang each Sunday in the surpliced choir
of a Kensington church, and I suppose he is the very best
chairman of a committee or of a public meeting of our own or
any other time. A Parnellite once said he had the unctuous-
ness of a retired grocer, but was contradicted by a more
reverent English Radical, who said, ' No, he has the unction
of grace,' whereas, the truth is, he has the platform manner
with him always.
I told the Court I had been a Kerry magistrate for the
previous thirty-seven years, and, after deposing to the earlier
state of my property, I insisted that moonlighting and ' land-
grabbing ' were unknown terms before 1 880. My examination
under the Attorney-General was, in fact, too practical and
useful to provide amusement for latter day readers.
My cross-examination was begun by Sir Charles Russell,
who led off with a sneer about my being the most popular
man in the county, and, when I adhered to other statements,
he added, ' Well, a very popular man. I will not put you on
COMMISSIONS 277
too high a pinnacle.' (Laughter.) Then for an hour and a half
he plied me with the best balanced statistical questions I ever
heard put in a hostile spirit, and without a note I could answer
every one. After considerable hesitation I admitted on con-
sideration that there was in Kerry one farmer benefiting by
the Act of 1870. I have never heard since that he was caught
and exhibited as the solitary outward and visible sign of the
inward and legal benefit of the legislative force of Imperial
Parliament.
Mr. Lockwood, to whom, as artist, I had been serving as
a model, evidently preferred to handle me with pencil rather
than with questions, for he was almost as brief as Mr. Reid.
It is my view that they both had consigned me to petrification
under Sir Charles Russell, and finding me alive and kicking,
thought me too tough to expire under such coups de grace as
they could inflict.
We came to banter when Mr. Michael Davitt suggested
that the young men of Castleisland took part in nocturnal raids
because there was no such social inducement to keep them quiet,
as a music-hall or a theatre ; but I told him there ought to have
been no inducement to them to shoot their neighbours, and
that Castleisland was past redemption.
He blandly alluded to my popularity with the tenants
before 1880; but I only said that I got on fairly well
with them, for I do not think that any agent was ever really
popular.
' Relatively ? ' insidiously.
' Yes.'
Then came this curious question, put with a gentleness that
would have aroused the suspicion of a babe : —
' Did you ever say, in reply to a question put to you by
Mr. Townsend Trench as to why you were not shot, that you
278 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
had told the tenants that if anything happened to you he would
succeed you as agent ? '
' Yes, I did say so ; but it is not original, because it is
what Charles 11. said to James 11.'
This historic reference, which elicited laughter in Court,
did not seem intelligible to my questioner, but some better
informed person probably soon quoted it to him : —
' Depend on it, brother James, they will never shoot me to
make you king.'
From the kid-glove amenities of Mr. Davitt to the aggres-
sive harshness of Mr. Biggar was a sharp contrast. He
heckled me vigorously, and I retorted to him pretty hotly.
A great deal had been expected of this cross-examination, but
the general opinion was that I gave rather better than I
received. Coolness is the despair of cross-examiners, and
I think mine made more impression on the Court than the
impulsiveness of a dozen inaccurate Nationalists.
Mr. Biggar asked : —
' You said you were popular in the district up to 1880 .'' '
I retorted with emphasis : —
* I never had a serious threat until you mentioned my
name in Castleisland, and then people told me, 'Get police
protection at once, or you will be shot ! '
That made the Court laugh. Mr. Biggar did not
appreciate the humour. He returned to the charge
viciously : —
' Did not some of your sympathisers light a bonfire in
1878 at Castleisland on account of the triumphs of your
buying the Harenc estate .-^ and did not the population of
Castleisland, who knew your character, scatter that bonfire,
and put it out ? '
' I heard they had a row over it. There were nine bon-
COMMISSIONS 279
fires lighted in Kerry after I succeeded. I was fairly popular
until you held up my name as a subject for murder in Castle-
island. You said Hussey might be a very bad man, but you
would take care of one thing — that if any person was charged
with shooting him, or any other agent, they would be defended,
which meant they would be paid.'
Mr. Biggar did not appear to relish the line he was on,
and shunted to another topic ; but he could not shake my
view that the rents of 1880 were, on the average, twenty-five
per cent, lower than in 1840.
' You bought the Harenc estate over the heads of the
tenants ^ '
' No, I did not.'
' You spoke about an address which you received from the
tenants when you were a candidate for Tralee ? '
' Yes.'
Then, with the snarl of a wild beast, Mr. Biggar blurted
out : —
' Have you any idea whether this was got up by the bailiff^s
on your property ? '
' I am quite certain it was not, because I had no bailifis on
the property. I gave an immense deal of employment, and I
believe that had something to do with it.'
Mr, Biggar presently \sat down, having made less of me
than he and his friends hoped.
On re-examination, the Attorney-General observed : —
' You say one of the bonfires, lighted when you succeeded,
was put out. I suppose the Irish people are not very averse
to a row at times .'' '
' Oh no.'
' And bonfires do produce rows at times ? '
' Certainly.'
28o REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
* Your popularity did not depend on one bonfire ? '
'No.'
Nor did my life, fortunately, depend on the good will
of Messrs. Parnell, Biggar, and their associates.
With reference to my freedom in telling the truth, an
application was made against me, in July 1891, for an
attachment of the Land Court. It ended abortively, and
permitted me to continue with perfect impunity to give in
letters to the Times evidence I was debarred from giving in
Court.
I certainly did not miss a chance of pointing out the
proper path to the Commissioners, and I have taken an even
affectionate interest in every department of the Land Com-
mission. Sarcastically, a Home Rule paper politely christened
me as the fatherly patron of the Court, and informed me that
my own conscience had given up communication with me, in
consequence of the many snubs it had received.
The intimate knowledge of my most private affairs that
this purports to represent proves the empty-headedness of the
writer, and when he added that the strong indictment re-
bounded off my hide because I had heard myself a hundred
times denounced in language equally eloquent, I can only agree
that he was a mere lisping babe in comparison with some
adjectival denunciators who, to their regret, find I am still
alive and equal to them all.
CHAPTER XXIII
LATER DAYS
With advancing years comes a change in the point of view,
for anticipation contracts even more than retrospect expands.
Associates of early days have passed away, and where I was
once one of a battalion, to-day I am only a survivor of the old
guard. This is not a cause for sadness, but an incentive to
take the best of what remains of life, though at times chills
and other ills, including doctors, drugs, and income-tax, do
their best to depress the survivor. It has been said to be a
characteristic of Irish humour that tears are very near the
laughter, and sometimes the unshed tears over lost oppor-
tunities must be the chief bitterness of age — one which I have
been mercifully spared.
After all, youth may round the world away, as Charles
Kingsley wrote ; but when the wheels are run down, to find at
home the face I loved when all was young is the blessing of
life, and when, at our golden wedding, our children called us
Darby and Joan, I am sure my wife and I were quite willing
to answer to the names.
This was happiness very different to that of George iv,,
who, when the death of Napoleon was announced to him in
the words : —
' Sir, your great enemy is dead,' exclaimed : —
' Is she .? By Gad ! ' thinking it was his wife.
I remember an amusing case that occurred in our own
281
282 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
family. One of my kith and kin, who had been married in
the year of the battle of Waterloo, died at the ripe old age of
a hundred and three.
There was a faithful old fellow on the estate who was
much attached to her, and this was his view, just before her
end : —
' I am sorry to hear the old mistress is dying, very sorry
indeed, for she 's been a good mistress to us all. Maybe if
she had taken snufF she 'd have lived to a good old age,' which
suggests wonder as to what his conception of longevity really
was. Probably the famous Countess of Desmond, who died
from the effects of a fall from a cherry-tree in her one hundred
and fortieth year, would have satisfied him.
I have already observed that much of my later years has'
been spent, much against my will, in London, and no portion
of this period was so satisfactory to me as my friendship with
Mr. J. A. Froude, which I regard as one of the privileges of
my Hfe.
My first acquaintance with him was in consequence of
reading his English in Ireland^ which I found so accurate and
informative that I wrote to ask him for an interview. I came
to like him very much, not only because he was the most
gifted writer I have met, but also because he understood
Ireland better than any other Englishman.
My first conversation with him was in his house in Onslow
Gardens, and there I very frequently sat for hours with him,
and he also presented me with copies of all his books, with an
autograph letter on the fly-leaf of each. I think the recent
Land Purchase Act, having been followed by increased agitation
for Home Rule in Ireland, bears out what he said about the
folly of trying to reconcile the irreconcilables, and also bears
out what Lord Morris called the 'criminal idiotcy' of attempting
LATER DAYS 283
to satisfy eighty Irish members, forty of whom would have to
starve directly they were satisfied.
So far as I am aware, Mr. Froude never contemplated
standing for Parliament, which would not have been a con-
genial atmosphere for him, though I am convinced he would
have made more mark at Westminster than his friend Mr.
Lecky, whom I never had the pleasure of meeting.
People to-day seem to regard Mr. Froude simply as the
Boswell of Carlyle, and, forgetting his own great services to his-
torical literature, degrade him to the mere chronicler of the
bilious sage of Chelsea. This is absolutely a distortion of fact,
and one calculated to do injury to the memory of both these
famous men. Therefore it may be of real utility to state that
during my long and very intimate acquaintance with Mr.
Froude, he never mentioned the name of Carlyle to me but
once, and that was to describe a conversation between Lord
Wolseley and Carlyle, which dealt with the contemporary
situation in Ireland. There was, therefore, nothing to show
me that my friend ' was utterly absorbed in the Carlyles, and
had no thought for any one else.' On the contrary, he was a
man full of keen interests, of which they were only one, and,
as far as I saw, an entirely subordinate one. He was a broad-
minded man, who hated petty misconception or a narrow view
of anything, and he would have been horrified at the prurient
indecency with which the most private affairs of the Carlyles
have been exposed and distorted to please a public which really
has a higher moral tone than is possessed by those who have
gibbeted the defenceless dead.
Mr. Froude was not addicted to talking much about his
own works, but I remember his telling me that Oceana had
paid him best of them all, and I think his view therein that the
colonies will recede from England when they are strong
284 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
enough, following the example of the United States, is
accurate. Just tax Canada as Ireland has been taxed, and see
how long the Canadians will be contented. The ministers of
George iii. tried that policy on the United States with the
result that, before many years, George had to receive the Pleni-
potentiary Minister of dominions over which he himself had
once reigned. It is absurd to compare Ireland with Yorkshire,
as has been done, for Ireland once had a separate Parliament, and
the Union was a matter of agreement, the outcome of which
was that Mr. Childers's Commission found she was taxed three
millions more than she should have been. The colonies are on
the alert, with all the rather irritable uppishness of youth on
the verge of manhood, and their younger generations are sure
to take full advantage of any tactless conduct of the British
Government. Such was Froude's view, and nothing has
happened since his death to shake its inherent probability.
The waves of Imperial patriotism in war time go for very
little, for Ireland is admittedly disloyal, and yet Irish soldiers
and Irish regiments were absolutely the most successful in
South Africa.
When the Government was introducing some quack
measure into Ireland, Froude wrote to me : —
' I see they are putting some fresh sticks under the Irish
pot, so it will soon boil over.'
Which it did, with a vengeance.
To the end of his days Froude was a great reader, but his
interest in Church affairs and in ecclesiastical differences had
completely died away. He told me that the most accurate
man of business of any period was Philip of Spain, and
that his notes and memoranda were a marvel of practical
aptitude. He derived the chief information for his History
of England from Spanish despatches, and would to-day
LATER DAYS 285
have benefited considerably by the translations of Major
Martin Hume.
Personally Froude had no cranks ; his disposition was most
urbane, whilst he was very neat in his appearance and also in
his handwriting. It would certainly be of interest to give a few
of his racy letters, too often undated, which I have preserved.
Unfortunately, his executors firmly refuse the necessary legal
consent, so that I am compelled to make my book irreparably
the poorer by omitting what should have been one of its most
attractive contents. In justice to Froude's memory, I ought
to add that there was nothing in his correspondence with me
that would have diminished his high repute. I mention this
because otherwise busybodies might have misinterpreted the
arbitrary action of his executors to the detriment of his fame.
A later friendship than that with Froude also must have
a sincere allusion in these pages, for I have derived much
pleasure from my association with Sir Henry Howorth, a ripe
old lawyer of Portuguese extraction, who has rendered valuable
political service by his polemical letters to the TimeSy on which
I can pass a most favourable opinion. His histories of the
Mongols, the Mammoth, and the Flood are possibly more
permanent, but they are not of such contemporary note. At
any rate, I respect them from a distance, whilst I admire the
political effusions as the capital work of a comrade under
arms, and one who is not afraid to verbally bludgeon any
formidable contemporary Hooligans.
Sir Henry Howorth occasionally breaks out into a story,
though he is more frequently a listener to mine. This is one
of his that I happen to recall : —
The Mayor of Richmond gave a dinner, at which a
distinguished Frenchman sat next the Mayor's son, and on
replying for the guests in imperfect English, observed : —
286 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
' I am vary happy to be here, and to meet my young
friend, who is a sheep of the old bloke,' meaning, of course, a
chip of the old block.
I plead guilty to have materially increased the interest
felt by Sir Henry in Irish affairs, which is not diminished
by the fact that a niece of Lord Ashbourne is married to
his son.
I think it was to him that I recommended another panacea
for the evils of Ireland, namely, that it would be a good plan
to exchange Ireland for Holland, for the Dutch would reclaim
Ireland, and the Irish would neglect the banks of Holland,
with the eventual result that the living Irish question would
be washed away.
Just now I alluded to a mayor, which reminds me of a
story about an Irish mayoress. As his Majesty has by this
time been entertained at several Corporation luncheons, it is
not invidious to give the tale.
The Mayoress, who was the heroine of the festal occasion
in question, felt completely overpowered by the royal society
in which she found herself, and when seated at the meal next
to the King, was absolutely unable to articulate any reply at
all to the observations he addressed to her, so eventually he
gave her up, and turned his colloquial attentions to the lady
on the other side.
After a while, fortified by the champagne, the Mayoress
grew more courageous, and, admiring the gentleman in full
uniform on her right, said to him : —
* Might I be so bowld as to ask whether you are Lord
Plunket.?'
' No,' he replied, with a smile, ' I am not.'
' Would you mind telling me who you are, for I 'm sure I
don't know ^ '
LATER DAYS 287
' I am the Duke of Connaught,' complaisantly replied her
neighbour, upon which she gasped : —
* Oh, God in Heaven, another of them ! ' and subsided into
unbroken silence for the rest of the repast.
Another amusing case of mistaken identity occurred when
Mr. Gladstone was concocting his treasonable Home Rule Bill.
He had been informed that Lord Clonbrook would be able to
give him invaluable information, so he told his wife to ask him
to luncheon. She, however, mistaking the name, invited the
late Lord Clonmel, a jovial sportsman known to his friends by
the nickname of ' Old Sherry.'
Somewhat surprised at being thus honoured, Lord Clonmel
consulted a few cronies, who all advised him to accept, and in
due course he proceeded to Downing Street, where he found
the French Ambassador was the only other guest. It is
possible that Mr. Gladstone thought him a little odd and
his attire somewhat demonstrative, but he was prepared for
any eccentricity in an Irish peer, and hardly noticed how
excellently his guest was doing justice to the meal, whilst
preserving impenetrable silence. Directly it was over, the
Prime Minister took him apart, and said : —
' Now I want you, privately and confidentially, to give me
your view of the exact relation between landlord and tenant in
Ireland.'
' Absolute hell, my dear boy, absolute hell,' was the
emphatic reply of the old sportsman.
That confidential conversation went no further ; but I
have never been sure that Lord Clonmel in the least overstated
the case.
This renewed allusion to the lower regions that appears so
closely connected with Irish aiFairs reminds me of an amusing
incident which took place in a Dublin tram. Two members
288 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
of the fair sex were discussing their plans for the summer in
the interior of a car, and one of them in a mincing brogue
said to the other : —
' I think I shall go to England this summer ; it is so
difficult in Ireland to get away from the vulgar Irish.'
' Faix,' screamed in much indignation an old Biddy sitting
opposite, ' if it 's the vulgar Irish you want to avoid, and the
English you want to be meeting, it 's to hell you must go, and
you 'd better go there this summer.'
That 's the sort of quick retort which a Scotchman calls
Irish insolence, but then, who expects appreciation of real
wit from any one canny ^ Wit is irresponsible, a truly Irish
propensity.
The two mincing young women were almost as much
disgusted as another old lady who found herself opposite a
stalwart working man, who incensed her by his frequent
expectoration. Gathering her skirts round her somewhat
ample form, she called the conductor and asked : —
' Is spitting allowed in this tram ? '
' By all manes, me lady,' was the gallant reply, ' shpit
anywhere you like.'
While alluding to trams, I cannot forbear relating one
other Dublin tale, which Lord Morris picked up from me
and was fond of telling. Its brief course runs thus :-^
' Would you tell me, if you plaze, where I '11 find the
Blackrock tram .'' ' asked a fussy little old woman of a police-
man, busily engaging in manoeuvring the traffic of a crowded
street.
' In wan minute you '11 find it in the shmall of your back,'
was the laconic reply.
The mere allusion to a query suggests how the British
tourist invariably starts trying to discuss the Irish question
LATER DAYS 289
directly he is across the Channel, and the insoluble part
to any Saxon is that half the Irish do not seem to desire a
solution at all.
' What a fine country this would be if it were peaceful,'
observed a thoughtful Britisher, with a Cook's ticket in his
pocket, on Killarney Lake.
' Peace ! What would we do with it .'' ' was the scornful
reply of his boatman, surprised for once into ejaculating the
truth.
Some landlords know how hopeless it is to attempt to
prevail against these sons of our epoch.
' It has been of no use to hold up a candle to the hydra-
headed devil,' said one landlord to me about his tenants, ' for
affability is more expensive than absenteeism. If I say, " Good
morning, Tom," the fellow expects twenty per cent, off the
rent, and " How 's your family .? " is considered to imply forty
per cent, abatement ' — and that cannot be called putting a
premium on good fellowship from the landlord's point of
view.
I have not said much about the way in which the Irish
in America foster insurrection, because it does not come
within my own province. But I have before me the type-
written essay on the subject composed by a Kerry landlord,
who, in his lifetime, had exceptional opportunities of judging
of this in New York, and from it I am tempted to take a
few sentences as the manuscript is never likely to see the
light of print.
' There are three distinct types of the Irish- American
Home Ruler, who have been and are even now supporting
with their dollars or their eloquence, the " Irish Cause " as it is
somewhat vaguely termed throughout the United States.
They can be distinguished as follows : —
T
290 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
' I . The American - born Irishman of immediate Irish
descent.
' 2. The native Irishman who has emigrated from Ireland.
' 3. The American Irish- American of long American descent,
who, though not inheriting a drop of Irish blood, is yet a
vigorous if not obstreperous ally of the Irish party in America.
This last is the most striking of the three, as on the face of
it, he would not appear to have any logical raison d'etre as a
political entity, but in reality exerts a powerful influence in
favour of " the Cause."
' One phase of the methods favoured by Irish-American
Home Rulers is the ingenuity with which cable reports, as
printed in the newspapers, are utilised for platform purposes.
Let an account be flashed under the Atlantic descriptive of
some agrarian demonstration in Ireland, which having been
declared illegal, is dispersed by military. Forthwith the
opportunity is seized, and on some public platform or at
some big banquet, the fervid orator poses as the champion
of human liberty. " Another British outrage upon the Irish
people ! A brutal and licentious soldiery let loose to gag
free speech and prevent, at the point of the bayonet, the
exercise of the rights of freeman. Thank God, that you and
I my Irish-American fellow-citizens, are living in this glorious
republic, where such things are impossible ! "
* After hearing this amazing outburst, it is well to recall
actual facts, and compare the methods of suppressing riots in
the United States and the United Kingdom. For example,
on July 12, 1 87 1, a number of Orangemen had organised a
procession through the principal thoroughfares of New York,
which was resented by a large contingent of Catholic Irish-
men, and on a violent collision ensuing, the State militia was
called out to restore order, a task they most effectually accom-
LATER DAYS 291
plished by firing volleys into the crowd of belligerents. The
citizen soldiery of America are accustomed to adopt summary
measures with impunity. They possess the resolution of the
Irish constabulary without the uncomfortable vacillation of
Dublin Castle to thwart their efforts.'
In the past the Irish vote in America has been hostile to
England, and has had much to do with that measure of ill-
feeling in the United States which has deterred that Union of
the Anglo-Saxon races that would enable them to lick creation.
An example may be cited in the case of Egan. This
man was an ex-Fenian leader, who wielded much influence
in Nationalistic circles as far back as the seventies, and when
he was Treasurer of the Land League, he is described by Mr.
Michael Davitt — who ought to have a fine capacity for dis-
criminating degrees of scoundrelism — as the most active and
able of the Nationalist leaders in Dublin. Some time after
the Phoenix Park murders he settled in the United States,
and whilst distinguishing himself by the exceptional violence
of his appeals on behalf of outrageous Ireland, he was actually
sent as American Minister to Chili. This would not have
caused me to notice him here but because it is necessary the
community should be warned that, unlike a good many of
his contemporaries and comrades, he is not an extinct volcano.
On March 10 of this current year, when still the chief
Nationalist in the States, he had a long interview with Count
Cassini, the Russian Minister at the Russian Embassy at Wash-
ington, just before a meeting of all the diplomatic representa-
tives, and the American correspondent of the Morning Post
does not hesitate to accuse Russia of financially assisting the
cause which Egan fosters. This sort of thing ought not to be
ignored in England. As an international action, it is hitting
below the belt, and when bad times come again to Ireland the
292 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Nationalists will look to the Ministers of the Great Bear for
funds, and are not likely to be disappointed. Still it is curious
that a Government which, at home, exiles Nihilists and other
bomb-throwers should, abroad, give contributions to the cause
that instigated the blowing up of my house, and the outrages
which rendered Ireland so notorious.
Not many years ago my wife was once more seriously
alarmed at Edenburn by the formidable proclivities of a man
P , who sat all day at my gate with a gun, which he said
he used for shooting rabbits : but we all knew I was the rabbit
he wanted to put in his bag. However, he has gone to
another sphere, and I am spending the present summer of
1904 very happily in the same county.
A couple of letters addressed there showing the way in
which an old widow expresses herself, when after great labour
she has delivered herself of an epistle, may not prove un-
diverting. The point is the amount she can obtain from her
children.
' Samuel Mr. Hussey Esq.
Sir — I hope you will be good enough to speak to
Downing to give me Justice. They have any amount of
cattle, 2 horses, and my son-in-law's wife carried 78 pounds
book account before Mr. Downing got the case in hands
I would get 2 hundred pounds. I think it little for
me according to the means that was theirs. Now sir, two
daughtors very ritch sir minding milk and butter and the one
taking it away and selling it. My son is not wright in his
health or mind. They turned him against me and he is more
fooHsh than your Honour would believe. He says he will
give his uncle that ran away long ago to America mortgage,
that Mr. Downing gave him power to do what he like and
those two daughters are very well off and they will not allow
LATER DAYS 293
me to do anything. Sir I am shamed of the way they are
treating me. My health and mind is very good, thanks be
to God and to you two Sir. They would not give me the
price of the habit that was berried with their father. Sir it
would not pay my debts and support me long. My father
lived 100 years. The Judge said I would live longer. Sir
three hundred pounds is little enough for me according to
the means that is theirs. If I went into the workhouse I
would not take what they wish to give me. £160 they
are giving me and I have my Confidence in God and in
your Honour's charity that you will be good enough to
speak for me. If the land don't sell to 5 hundred
pounds I will give it back to the attorney. Will your
Honour tell them and I '11 pray to God sir ever to bless
you. Faithfully,
Mary Lucy.'
And the same dame favoured me with this further effusion:
'Mr. Hussey Esq.
Sir — 100 pounds was offered to me before the purchase,
a foolish priest making little of me, himself trying to get it
for his friends. The Bishop, Sir, is kind to me always. For
he knows I was wronged and he don't like the foolish priest,
and when I complain of him he is very good. Sir some good
people tell me that anyone at all have no claim but myself and
I wish it was true as all is very valuable. Mr. Connor is
very truthful and nice to me Sir when I will see him I am
very sure he will wish me well and all the good Honourable
Gentlemen and yourself are the best of all to my equals. I
know it very well and I will for ever pray to God in Heaven
for you.
Faithfully,
Mary Lucy.'
294 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
So a landlord and agent, even in 1 904, still has a few of
the patriarchal attributes in the eyes of the tenants. But to
sift wheat from chaff is easier than to sift truth from the
lying blandishments employed on such occasions.
The reference to the priest shows that though always
feared, when the land-passion seizes a parishioner, he is set at
as much defiance as possible, should he be moderate, and these
are the only occasions when they venture to tell their con-
fessor unpleasant truths to his face, for in some country
districts they are still convinced that the priests have power to
transform them into frogs and mice.
A priest once threatened a bibulous parishioner, that if he
did not become more sober in his habits, he would change
him into a mouse.
' Biddy, me jewel, I can't believe Father Pat would have
that power over me,' said the man that same evening as the
shadows fell, ' but all the same you might as well shut up the
cat.'
Over elections the priests have paramount influence as I
have already shown, but may cite an example at the last County
election in Kerry, when three candidates stood. Sir Thomas
Esmonde (Anti-Parnellite), Mr. Harrington (Parnellite), and
Mr. Palmer (Conservative). The last-named out of a poll of
six thousand obtained seventy votes. One of them was given
after the following fashion.
An illiterate voter at Killorglin being asked in the polling
booth how he wished to vote, replied : —
' For my parish priest.'
' But he is not a candidate. The three are Esmonde,
Palmer, and Harrington. '
' Well, then, I '11 vote for Palmer, because it is more like
Father Lawler than the others.'
LATER DAYS 295
Naturally all concerned were convulsed with laughter, but
the vote was duly recorded.
It is no uncommon thing to see priests carefully teaching
illiterate voters the appearance of the name of the candidate
for whom they are to poll, and also giving them printed cards
merely containing his name, so that they can recognise it on
the voting-card.
Of course an Irishman would take a bribe one way and
calmly vote another. But even this diplomatic tendency is
outwitted by the priests, for nowadays, when they have any
doubt of the political sincerity of a man, they insist on his
declaring himself an illiterate voter. Then the whole question
of who is to be voted for is gone through audibly and verbally,
so that the honesty of the voter is known to those hanging
round. In the parish of Milltown, the education is as com-
plete as in any in Ireland, but at the last election, one third of
the voters confessed themselves illiterate, with the result anti-
cipated by the priest.
If the priest understands his parishioner — a thing which
admits of no possible shadow of doubt — it is equally certain
that the Englishman does not, as is shown by the following
frivolous tale, always a favourite of mine.
* Paddy,' said a tourist at Killarney, ' I '11 give you sixpence
if you '11 tell me the biggest lie you ever told in your life.'
' Begorra, your honour 's a gentleman ! Give me the
sixpence ! '
No one would have thought of making such an offer
to an English loafer, and no English loafer would have had
the wit to so neatly earn his emolument.
It is the assumption of simplicity that does the trick,
and so well is that put on that it comes close to the real
thing.
296 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
The other day, when the King and Queen were at Punches-
town, a Britisher chartered a car at Naas to drive out to the
course, and on the way remonstrated with the carman on
the starved condition of his horse, whose ribs would have
served for an anatomical study.
' Well, your honour,' the jarvey explained, ' it 's an
unlucky horse.'
' How unlucky ? ' asked the Englishman.
' Well, it 's this way, your honour. Each morning I toss
with that horse whether he shall have his feed of oats or I have
my glass of whisky, and would your honour credit it, the horse
has lost these ten days past.'
I am reminded of the reply given by Lord Derby to a
gentleman who sent him a dozen of very light claret, which
he said would suit his gout. Lord Derby subsequently
thanked him, but said he preferred the gout, and I have no
doubt that that horse, had he been able to give tongue, would
have been an ardent upholder of teetotalism when it ensured
him a feed of oats.
One more story of Lord Derby, as I have just mentioned
his name : —
A worthy trader had bothered him to let him stand
for a certain borough on the Tory ticket, but the Whig
was returned unopposed on the day of the nomination, and
the candidate was subsequently attacked by Lord Derby for
not coming forward as he had promised.
The man was almost as shaky in his aspirates as in his
political propensities, and his reply was : —
' I would have stood, my lord, but there was a 'itch in
the way.'
' It was the more necessary for you to come to the scratch,'
was the immediate retort.
LATER DAYS 297
I always find that story popular at the Carlton, where
I spend my afternoons when in London. I was proposed
by Mr, James Lowther and seconded by the Duke of
Marlborough, and very much obliged have I been to them
both, for I have many acquaintances there, and it has all
the conveniences of a comfortable hotel, without having
to pay extravagantly for the privilege of looking at a
waiter.
In the intervals of reading the papers and listening to
other people, I have there, as elsewhere, endeavoured to
impart what I know to others who know nothing about
Ireland. They know much more about China or the
aboriginal tribes of Australia, in London, than they do on
the topics dearest to me.
An English Radical member, after a long chat with my
son Maurice, observed : —
' You actually mean to say that if Home Rule were
given to Ireland you would not be allowed to reside
there .? '
' Certainly not,' replied Maurice, who knew what he was
talking about.
The member replied that he could not believe him,
but that if he had known that that was the real nature of
the Bill he would never have voted for it.
I could not desire a better example of English wisdom
on this subject — one which Lord Rosebery has consigned
to a distant date in futurity, foreseeing that if the Opposi-
tion are to be handicapped with Home Rule they will not
stand a forty to one chance at the next election.
That election will, of course, turn on Protection, and
I am therefore tempted to quote from an article I con-
tributed to Murray's Magazine in July 1887, entitled 'After
298 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
the Crimes Bill, What Next ? ' for I feel my forecast of
over fourteen years ago may serve a useful purpose to-day.
It ran thus : —
' In my next suggestion I feel that I am treading on
dangerous ground ; still, having undertaken to suggest a
remedy for Irish discontent and anarchy, I must not shrink
from offending the prejudices of some of the wise men of
England.
' Ireland is an agricultural country. There are in Ulster,
as in England and Scotland, factories which support the
greater portion of the population, and cause the prosperity
of the province ; but outside of Ulster, cattle and butter
are the staple products. And how does Ireland stand in
her only market, England, as compared with other nations .''
She enjoys free trade in butter, no doubt, but so do France
and Holland ; but these countries, while they find an open
market in England, tax all English and Irish productions,
and being manufacturing countries themselves they can afford
to sell butter at so cheap a rate as to swamp Ireland's market.
A slight protective duty on foreign butter would be hailed
with gratitude in Ireland, and do more to allay discontent
than any further acts of so-called " generosity."
' Again, the great thinly peopled countries of the West
find in England a free market for cattle and flour, and
America taxes very highly all English goods. Why not
place Ireland on a par with America, by levying a slight
protective duty on American beef and flour ^ Every little
village in Ireland formerly had its flour mill, which worked
up the corn grown in the country as well as imported grain.
These mills are now generally idle and the men who worked
them ruined. A small duty on manufactured flour would
restore this industry, and enable men with some capital to
LATER DAYS 299
give employment to labour, and to work up in small quantities
for the farmer, at a cheap rate, their home-grown corn, as well
as to grind imported grain. Our own colonies may have, no
doubt, a right to object to our taxing their goods, but not so
foreign countries.
' The Free Trade system of England would, no doubt, have
been successful if reciprocated. But the question is worth
considering, whether the English people do not now lose
more by taxation resulting from the chronic state of rebellion
in Ireland than she gains by bringing in American beef and
flour, and foreign butter and butterine, free, to the im-
poverishment of Ireland, and of the agricultural portions of
England and Scotland ? " Remedial measures " for an agri-
cultural country are certainly not those which spoil its
market.'
Don't dismiss that as pre-Chamberlainese Protection for
it is sheer common-sense on a matter of national importance,
and what I wrote in 1887, ^^^er many years, has become
part of the political convictions of a great and an increasing
party.
I wonder what the Protective party will be like when
it eventually comes into office. Promises out of office
are often the whale which only produces the sprat of legis-
lation when the time of fulfilment arrives. This is an
impartial opinion on most Cabinets of the last fifty years.
One of the few occasions on which a recent British
Government has recently shown some signs of appreciating
a really keen and capable man was when they made Mr. Ellison
Macartney, Master of the Mint.
I wrote and congratulated him, observing that I hoped
he would never be short of money, but if that was his plight
all he had to do was to coin it for himself.
300 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
I have a bad recollection for faces, and one day in Dublin
his father came up to me, and seeing I did not remember him,
recalled a story with which I had amused him in the lobby of
the House of Commons.
It was to this effect, and may prove new to others : —
Coming out of Glasgow one evening two Irishmen way-
laid a Scotsman for the sake of plunder. He was nearly
enough for them both, but numbers prevailed, and when they
had mastered him, after searching his pockets, they only found
three halfpence.
Said one Hibernian to the other : —
' Glory be to the Saints, Mick, what a fight he made for
three halfpence.'
* Oh,' replied the other, ' it was the mercy of the Lord he
had not tuppence, or he 'd have killed the pair of us.'
Killing suggests the Kerry militia, the corps in which
no one dies except of good fellowship, one which has done
a good deal to unite the divergent interests of north and
south Kerry, and which provides fine physical development
for soldiers of all ranks.
Last year the militia received a grant of £120 from
Government to be expended on route marching with the
band through the county in order to promote recruiting.
The net haul in the Milltown district was the village idiot,
who promised to enlist after the next sessions if the jailer
did not take him — he being apprehensive of committal to
prison.
But even this was not enough, for his mother came to
a neighbouring magistrate, weeping and praying for his
remission, because —
' It was a drunken freak on Patrick, for if the lad had
kept his senses, sure, he would never have done it.'
LATER DAYS 301
Another Kerry man being asked why his son did not
enlist, replied : —
' Ah, Jamsie was not a big enough scamp for the militia,
because you have to be a great blackguard before you can
get in there.'
Which shows that the camel and needle's eye trick is
easier to perform than to induce a country-bred man to
enlist in the King's militia ; though once in, every fellow
loves it.
This intimation of an army suggests an anecdote of the
past war-time. The militia was being embodied, and several
landlords who held commissions were going under canvas with
the corps at Gosport. One of his tenants stopped a popular
landlord on the road and asked : —
' What do you want to go to be shot at by them Boers
for, sir ? '
' To be sure, Tim, my tenants have the first right to shoot
me, have they not? ' was the prompt reply.
The fellow roared with laughter at the retort, and after
shaking hands, wished him luck.
It was also characteristic of Irish proclivities for a soft-
voiced woman on the estate to say to Miss Leeson
Marshall : —
' When the war broke out first we were all praying that
the English might be beaten out of South Africa. Then
when Mr. Marshall went away to the army, we thought we
should not like his side to lose, so we changed our prayers
round by the blessing of God and His Saints.'
If any real impression has been given in these pages of
the inconsistent Irish character, the genuine character of this
sentiment will be comprehensible. It has been said that
an Irishman will tell the truth about everything except one
302 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
thing — that, of course, is a horse. When not engaged in
shooting his landlord, the tenant is by no means disaffected
to him, whilst the female appurtenances, mindful of all the
small doles they obtain, are much more voluble in their cordial
protestations.
Sometimes the women are enigmatical : one does not
know if they are acting out of kindness or from duplicity.
For example, not so long ago a girl came up to one of
my daughters in the road and said to her : —
*For the love of God tell your mother to order your
father's coffin for he '11 need it, the Saints preserve us.'
And with that she started away before there was time to
reply.
Nothing came of it, of course : nothing ever has, of real
importance.
Nothing, alas, also seems so often to be the verdict on
life when looking back. Mine, however, has been too full
a one, not only with griefs and trials but also with happiness
and fun, for me to dismiss it thus. There has been so much
more to live through than to write about, and yet, in these
pages, has been told something which would have gone for
ever untold if I had not in old age become garrulous. Things
forgotten have been recalled to my mind and may prove
suggestive to other people who read them, and it is my
hope, in concluding, that I have provided diversion and a
little food for reflection.
I feel that a critic may consider too much that has been
set down here is disconnected, yet if he will let a gramophone
record an animated conversation, he will find that it ebbs and
flows with the uncertain babbling of a brook — and so it has
been with me. Only the other day, in the preface to
LATER DAYS 303
Camden's History of the British Islands^ I came across the
phrase : —
' bookes receive their doome according to the reader's capacitie,'
and that alone emboldens me to hope for some measure
of success for the present volume. Readers do not always
want serious subjects, and it is in an hour when they desire
a little diversion that I hope my reminiscences may commend
themselves, for in a phrase not unknown in my native Kerry,
this book consists of ' little things, and that away.'
THE END
INDEX
Abbey of St. Denis, Paris, 79.
Abbeyfeale, 253, 259.
Abercorn, Duke of, 165.
Aberdeen, Earl of, 167-168.
Lady, 167-168.
Acts —
Arrears, 183, 184, 197.
Crimes, 183, 262.
Encumbered Estate, 71.
Habeas Corpus Suspension, 225.
Irish Church, 44, 180-18 1.
Land, see under Land.
Riot, 251.
Union, of, 180.
Westminster, of 1871, 251.
Adams, Mr. Gould, of Kilmachill, 207.
Aghabey, 83.
Aghadoe, 3, 95, 254.
Agriculture, Commission on, 268.
Albert, Prince, 163.
America, Irish dissatisfaction fostered
289; Home Rulers in, 289-290.
Anderson, Rev. J. A., O.S.A., 99.
Ardfert, 3.
Argyll, Duke of, 174.
Ashbourne, Lord, 286.
Athenry, 171.
Avonmore, Lord, 12.
Balfour, Mr. A. J., Chief Secretaryship
172-174.
Mr. Gerald, Chief Secretaryship
172-173.
of Burleigh, Lord, 274.
Ballincushlane, 121.
Ballot, effects of introduction, 1 94.
Bally M'ElJigott, 6.
Ballybeggan, 4.
m.
Ballybunion, 90.
BaJIyporeen, Petty Sessions at, 164.
Ballyvourney parish, 71.
Bandon, Lord, 121.
Bantry, 13, 39, 52.
Barry, Lord Justice, 21-22, 216.
Barter, Dr., of Cork, 147.
Bartlett, Sir Ellis Ashmead, 112.
Batt, Father, 123-124.
Beaconsfield, Earl of, 122, 167.
' Beal-Bo,' 90-91.
Beaufort, fenianism in, 254.
Belfast, population of, 176.
Bernard, Mr. Edward Morrogh, 265-266.
Mrs. Morrogh, 265-266.
Bessborough, Earl of, 270.
Bewlay, Mr., 274.
Bianconi, Mr. Charles, 78.
Biggar, Mr., Pamell Commission on, 278-
280.
Bishops, nomination of, 122.
Blarney, monument at, 116.
Blasquet Islands, Lord Cork's property in, 200.
Blennerhassett, Mr. Arthur, 258.
Mr. and Mrs. Robert, 3.
Mr. Roland, K.C., 95, 96.
Bodkin, Galway family of, 7.
Bogs, need for draining of, 141-142.
Bogue, Farmer, 32-34, no.
Boycott, Captain, 213.
Boycotting, 213, 214, 249, 250; Mr,
Pamell on, 216-217.
Brady, Lord Chancellor, 75.
Breaing, value of land at, 259.
Bright Clauses, the, 82.
Bright, Mr. Jacob, 177.
Mr. John, 177,
Brown, Valentine, 3-4.
U
3o6 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Buccleuch, Duke of, 268.
Buller, Sir Redvers, 157.
Burke, Mr. T. H., 252.
Burns, David, steward at Ardrum, 107.
Byrne, Mr., 89.
Cadogan, Earl of, 169.
Cahirciveen, fenianism at, 66, 1525 drink
traffic at, 113; poverty of, 214..
Cahimane, sale of, by Hussey family, 5.
Cairns, Lord, 122, 271.
Callaghan, Michael, 273.
Callinafercy estate, 144, 159.
Garden, ' Woodcock,' 255.
Carew Manuscript, the, 4.
Carlingford, Lord, Mr. Chichester Fortescue,
165, 169, 204, 268, 269.
Carlisle, Earl of, 162-163.
Carlton Club, 117, 188, 297.
Carlyle, Mr. Thomas, 283.
Carnarvon, Earl of, 167.
Cassini, Count, 291.
Castle Gregory, Walter Hussey, owned by, 4.
Castleisland, opposition to Mr. Hussey at,
84, 214, 215 ; Mr. Dease assaulted at, 95 j
drink traffic at, 102, 103.
Castle of Doon, ruins of, 91.
Castle-Drum, land owned by Hussey family
at, 2.
Castlerosse, Lord, 153-154.
Cattle, outrages on, 220-221.
Cavanagh, Mr., 152.
Mrs., 152-153-
Cavendish, Lord Frederick, 174, 252.
Chamberlain, Mr. Joseph, 86, 165, 175.
Characteristics of Irish nature, 140-161.
Charlestown, Land League outrage at, 253.
Chatelherault, dukedom of, claimed by Duke
of Abercorn, 165.
Chief Secretaries —
Balfour, Mr. A. J., 172-173.
Mr. Gerald, 172-173.
Forster, Mr. W. E., 170-173.
Fortescue, Mr. Chichester (Lord Car-
lingford), 169.
Lowther, Mr. James, 172, 174.
Morley, Mr. John, 175.
Naas, Lord, 169.
Chief Secretaries — continued —
Peel, Sir Robert, 169, 170.
Trevelyan, Sir George, 174-175.
Childers, Mr., Royal Commission, on, 181,284.
Christian, Lord Justice, 83, 89.
Clare, Earl of (Col. Fitzgibbon), 164.
Clarendon, Earl of, 163.
Clergy —
Protestant, 120-122.
Roman Catholic, 11 5-1 20.
Clonbrook, Lord, 287.
Clonmel, Earl of, 287.
Cobbe, Miss, 57, 177.
Coffey, Bishop, 119.
Denis, 257.
Colthurst, Sir George, 38, 49, 96; Bally-
voumey, estate of, 208 ; Rathcole estate,
outrages on, 212.
Commissions on Land Question, Mr.
Hussey's evidence before, 268-280; Par-
nell case, 275-280.
Connor, Jeremiah, 245.
Thomas, 245.
Constabulary, the, 127-132.
Conway, Captain, 3.
Miss Avis (Mrs. Robert Blennerhassett),
3-
Corelli, Miss Marie^ 98.
Cork and Orrery, Earl of, 199, 200, 218.
Cork Constitutional, Edenburn outrage, on
the, 239-240.
Examiner, the, 96, 97, 244.
Corkaquiny, barony of, castles of the Hussey
family in, 2.
Corn Law question, 51.
Corragun, Sir Dominic, 132.
County Club, Cork, 49.
Tralee, 97, iii, 242.
of, on
Cowen, Mr. Joseph, 204.
Cowper, Earl, 166 j Commission
Land Act, 271-272.
Cox, Sir William, 13.
Creameries, establishment of, 161.
Crime in Kerry, Judge CBrien on, 229-234.
Crosbie, Bishop John, 3.
Colonel, 229.
Cruickshank family, the, 261.
Curraghila, land value at, 259.
INDEX
307
Daily Telegraph, the, 222, 255.
Daly, Cornelius, Denis, and John, 245.
Davitt, Mr. Michael, 202, 260, 277, 278,
291.
De Bruce, Edward, 13.
De Freyne case, 118.
De Huse, Herbert, 6.
or Hussy, Nicholas, 6.
De la Huse, family name of Hussey, 6.
De Lacy, Hugh, Earl of Ulster, 6.
Dease, Mr., assault on, 95, 97.
Sir Gerald, 95.
Deasy, Lord Justice, 83.
Delane, Anne, 272.
Denny, Edmund, 3.
family, 8.
Miss, the ' Princess Royal,' 8.
Mr. Francis, 155.
Derby, Lord, Land League, threats from, 40 ;
Archbishop Magee, opinion of, 44 ; anec-
dote of, 296.
Derrynane Bay, smuggling at, 24.
Desmond, Countess of, 282.
Devonshire, Duke of, 269.
Dillon, Mr., 79.
Dillwyn, Mr., 94.
Dinan, Jeremiah, 245.
Dingle, Hussey family settled at, 2 5 present
day, 5, 6 j yeomanry corps of, 14 ; poverty
of, 214.
Dispensaries, 135-139.
Doctors, dispensary, appointment of, 132.
Dolly's Brae, Orange procession at, 163.
Don, the O'Conor, 270.
Doneghan, Mr., 42-43.
Donelly, Mr. William, 52.
Donoughmore, Lady, 8.
Donovan, Sir Henry, 99.
Douglas, Mr., 57.
Downing, Miss Ellen, * Mary,' 63.
Mr., 292.
Dowse, Baron, land purchase, opinion on,
205; boycotting on, 214; Grand Jury of
Kerry, address to, 261; commission on
the Land Law, on, 270.
Doyle family, 250.
Drink, prevalence of, 101-114.
Dublin, population of, 176.
Dudley, Lord, 169.
DufFerin, Lord, 185.
Duffy, Mr. Charles Gavan, 100.
Dun, Mr. Finlay, 192-193, 207, 209.
Dunraven, Lord, 173, 271.
Edenburn, home of Mr. Hussey at, 73, 80-
81 ; outrage at, 235-247.
Egan, Patrick, 291.
Elections in Kerry, description of, 93-100.
Emigration, agents' treatment of emigrants,
57 ; American offer to, 57-58.
Emmett, Robert, 156.
Engineering Surveyors' Institution, 42.
Erne, Lord, 213.
Esmonde, Sir Thomas, 294.
Evictions, number of, on Lord Kenmare's
estate, 221.
Faith, Mr. George, 46.
Famine, the, 50-59.
Farms, sub-divisions of, 36.
Farranfore, evictions at, 251.
Fenianism, 60-70.
FitzGerald, family of, 3.
Lady (Miss Julia Hussey), 16.
Mr., member of Land Commission, 274.
Mrs., 173.
Mrs. Robert (Miss Ellen Hussey), 16.
Richard, 245.
Sir Peter (Knight of Kerry), 1 6.
Fitzpatrick, Sir Denis, 189.
FitzWalter, Theobald, 6.
Flaherty, Tim, 48.
Forster, Mr. Arnold, 171.
Mr. W. E., Chief Secretary, 163, 169,
170-172; criticism, sensitiveness to, 211;
quoted, 216.
Free Trade, 51, 299.
Freeman, the, 96.
French, Mr., 222.
Froude, Mr. J. A., Mr. Hussey and, friend-
ship between, 5, 177, 227, 282-285.
Fry Commission, the, 185, 272.
Sir Edward, 272.
Gadstone and Ellis, Messrs., 258.
Generals, famous Irish, 156-157.
3o8 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Gentleman, Mr. Goodman, 82.
Mr. Henry, 245.
Geraldine family, the, 192.
Gladstone, Mr. —
Irish emigration, attitude towards, 58.
Legislation, effects of, 60-61, 67, 108,
131, 179-193-
Letter to, from Mr. Arthur Blenner-
hassett, 258-259.
Mr. Hussey and, 84., 177-178.
Mr. W. E. Forster and, 170, 171.
Nationalist party, attitude towards, 195-
196.
Mrs., anecdotes of, 45, 287.
Glasgow, morality of, 36.
Globe, the, 256.
Godfrey, Dowager Lady, 73.
Sir John, 154, 155.
Gough, Lord, 157.
Granard, Earl of, 118, 259.
Grant, Mr., 193.
Granville, Earl, 165.
Graves, Mr., 48.
Griffin, Andrew, 264.
Guest, Sir Ivor, 166.
Guillamore, Chief Baron, 1 60.
Gull, Mr., 132.
Haggerty, Jeremiah, outrage on, 217.
Harenc estate, the, bought by Mr. Samuel
Hussey, 82-92, 278 ; Land Act, effect on,
274.
Harenc, Mr., death of, 82.
Harnett, Mr., 251.
Harrington, Mr. T., 263-264, 294.
Harris, Mr. Matthew, 251.
Headley, Lord, 254, 255.
Henry, Mr. Mitchell, 204.
Herbert family, the, 5.
Mr. Charles, 3.
Mr. A. E., 252, 255 ; murder of, 226-
227.
Mr. William, 3.
Hewson, Mr., 84.
Hickson, Captain John, ' Sovereign of Dingle,'
anecdote of, 13-14.
Colonel, 273.
Mr., 79.
Hickson, Mr. Robert, 13.
Mrs., 53.
Mrs. Judith, 15.
Higgins, Bishop, 119.
Hitchcock, Mr., 6.
Hoffman, tenant of Mr. Hussey, case of, 273.
Hogan, William, 245.
Hogg, Mr., 21.
Home Rule Bill, 282, 287, 297.
Party, the, 194-195-
Rulers, Irish- American, 289-290.
Hore, Mr., house and haggards of, burnt, 4.
Houghton, Lord, 168-169.
Howorth, Sir Henry, 285-286.
Huddard's School at Dublin, 20-21.
Huddleston, Mr. Henry, house of, burnt, 4.
Husse, Sir Hugh, 6.
Hussey, origin of name, 6.
Colonel Maurice, 5-6, 100.
Miss Anne, 19.
Clarissa, 126.
Mary, 16.
Mr. Edward, 16.
James, 15-16, 19.
John, brother of Mr. Samuel, 15.
son of Mr. Samuel, 16.
Maurice, 16, 253, 297.
Michael, M.P. for Dingle, 7.
'Red Precipitate,' 10, 12, 15.
Robert, 1 6.
Samuel, M., parentage of, 10-12;
early life and education of, 20-29; farm-
ing, 30-37 ; land agent in Cork, 38 ^/ seq. ;
to Colthurst property, 7 1 ; candidature of,
for Parliament, 96, 98 ,• Irish Land Act
Commission, evidence before, 205-206,
268-280; press criticisms of, 209-210, 248,
255, 256, 275; Land Leaguers, threats
from, 214,224, 235-247; Edenburn out-
rage, 235-247; 'Woodcock,' 255; land
sales, series of, letter to the 'Times re-
garding, 259; Times, letter to, re Mr.
Harrington, 263-264; Parnell Commission,
evidence before, 276-280; Froude, friend-
ship with, 282-285 ; Sir Henry Howorth,
friendship with, 285-286; Protection,
opinion on, 297-299.
Walter, 4.
INDEX
309
Hussey, Mrs. (Miss Mary Hick son), 53;
descent of, 12-13.
Samuel (Miss Julia Agnes Hick-
son), 13.
Sir John, Earl of Galtrim, 6.
Inch East and Ardroe, 258.
Island, 258.
Industries, 142.
Inniscarra, 38.
Irish Citizen, the, 248 .
Irish Land Commission, Mr. Hussey's
evidence before, 205, 270-275.
Iveragh, barony of, 18.
Jeffreys, Mr., 49.
Jenkinson, Mr., 246.
Jenner, Mr., 132.
Johnson, Judge, 83.
Kanturk, 108.
Keagh, Judge, anecdote of, 87-88; opinion
of Irishmen, 130.
Kellegher, Mr. Jerry, anecdotes of, 10-12.
Kellehers, the, 88.
Kelly, Miss Mary, 'Eva,' 63.
Kenmare family, the, 3.
Earl of, succession to title, 95; ex-
penditure on estate improvements, 152,
196, 209, 221,- anecdote of, 153; criti-
cisms of, 209, 255; House of Commons,
debate on estate of, 221 ; departure from
Ireland, 224.
district, poverty of, 214.
Kerry, population, etc., of, 36-37; clergy
and churches in, 119
Kerry Sentinel, Edenburn outrage, on the,
240.
Kilcockan parish, land value in, 193.
Kilcoleman, woods of, 155.
Kildare Street Club, 49.
Killarney, crime in, 66, 214.
House, home of Lord Kenmare, 115,
209.
Killeentiema House, home of Mr. A.
Herbert, 226.
parish, church revenue of, 121.
Killiney parish, property of Hussey family
in, 4.
Killorglin, Puck Fair at, 95, 104, 105 ;
voting at, 294.
Kilmainham gaol, 68.
Kilronan, evictions at, 258.
Kimberley, Earl of (Lord Wodehouse), 1 64,
165.
Kitchener, Lord, 157.
Laing, Mr., M.P. for Orkney, 198-199,
200.
Land Acts, Wyndham, the, 40, 41, 58, 187-
188, 192; Ashbourne, the, 41, 264;
Balfour's, of 1896, 84; Gladstone's, of
1870, i8i, 185-186; of 1881, 71, 181-
189 ; effects of, 196-200, 274, 282.
Land League —
Church and, 118.
Effects of, 199-200, 202, 208.
Outrages of, 199, 212-222, 246, 248,
267.
Le Fanu, Mr. W. R., 77.
Mr. Sheridan, 77.
Leary, Darby, 245.
Lecky, Mr., loo, 283.
Leehys, the, feud of, 88.
Lefevre, Mr. Shaw, Commission of, 269.
Lehunt, Colonel, 4.
Leinster, Duchess of, 169.
Leitrim, Lord, 226.
Limerick, Mr. Hogg's school at, 21.
Lismore, famine fever at, 54; agricultural
depression in, 193; estate of Duke of
Devonshire at, 269-270.
Listowel, crime in, 87, 214.
Lloyd, Mr. Clifford, 128.
Lockwood, Mr. Frank, 277.
Logue, Dr., Archbishop of Armagh, 1 18.
Lombard and Murphy, Messrs., 83.
Londonderry, Marquis of, 168.
Longfield, Judge, 258.
Longford, clerical help for Lord Granard in,
118.
Lord-Lieutenants —
Abercorn, Duke of, 165.
Aberdeen, Earl of, 167-168.
Cadogan, Earl of, 169.
3IO REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Lord-Lieutenants — continued —
Carlisle, Earl of, 162-163.
Carnarvon, Earl of, 167.
Clarendon, Earl of, 163.
Cowper, Earl, 166.
Dudley, Earl of, 169.
Houghton, Lord, 168-169.
Kimberley, Earl of, 164..
Londonderry, Marquis of, 168.
Marlborough, Duke of, 165-166.
Spencer, Earl, 166-167.
Zetland, Earl of, 168.
Lower Curryglass, agricultural depression in,
193.
Lowther, Mr. James, 172, 174, 297.
Lucy, Mary, letters of, to Mr. Hussey, 292-
293.
Luxnow, 83.
Macaulay, Dr., 117.
Macartney, Mr. Ellison, 299.
MacCarthy, Bishop, 119.
Florence, 4.
Mr., 115.
MacCarty, Mr. Daniel, 18.
MacGregor, Sir Duncan, 128.
Magee, Archbishop, 35, 44-45.
Magheries, the, owned by the Hussey family,4.
Maguire, Mr., M.P. for Cork, 43.
MahafFy, Prof., 252.
Manchester Guardian on the Edenburn out-
rage, 238-239.
Marlborough, Duchess of, 206.
Duke of, 165-166, 297.
Marriage customs, 142-146.
Marshall, Miss Leeson, 301.
Mr. Leeson, 144, 159, 2065 anecdote
of, 301.
Martin, Miss, books of, 30.
Mr. Richard, M.P., 55.
Mr. Robert, 274.
Mason, John, 245.
Matthew, Father, 61, 101-102.
Maynooth, 116, 118, 122, 180.
M'Calmont, Captain, 261.
McCarthy, Mr. Justin, 264.
M'Cowan, Mr., of Tralee, 220.
M'Elligott, John, 245.
Merry, Mr. Andrew, 120.
Milnes, Mr. Monckton, 168.
Millstreet, crime in, 217, 222.
Milltown, voting at, 295.
Fair, price of cattle at, 273.
Minard Castle, 4.
Minerals, 142.
Mitchel, Mr. John, 55, 64.
Monaghan, Chief Justice, 87.
Monk, Lord, 94.
Monsell, Hon. Mrs., 65.
Moore, Mr. Crosbie, 164-165.
Moriarty, Dr., Bishop of Killarney, 66, 67,
119.
Morley, Mr., 170, 175-176, 177, 178.
Morning Post, 291.
Morris, Lord, anecdotes of, 69, 76, 87, 137,
167-168, 170, 254-255, 288.
Mr. Edward, 111-112.
Mountmorres, Lord, 226.
Moynihar, Michael, 245.
Muckross, 5, 166.
Miiller, Prof. Max, 131.
Mullins, Miss, 8.
Murder, encouragement of, 227-228.
Murphy, Cornelius, murder of, 231.
Mr., 88.
Patrick, of Rath, case of, 222.
Murray, George, 13.
Judith, 13.
Mrs. William (Miss Anne Grainger),
13-
(Miss Ann Hornswell), 13.
Sir Walter, Lord of Drumshegrat, 1 2.
Mr. William, 13.
Murray" s Magazine, 297.
Naas, Lord, 169.
posting arrangements at, 31.
Nagle, Mr., 46-47.
Nason family, 193.
National League Police, 250.
Nationalists, the, 196.
Neill, Daniel, 245.
Neligan, John, 245.
Ne-iv York Tablet, the, 210.
NicoU, Mrs., 241.
Nield, Mr., 253.
INDEX
311
Nolan, Mr., of Ballinderry, 55.
Normanton, Lord, 259.
O'Brien, Judge, address to Grand Jury on
state of Kerry, 228-234.
Smith, 64-65.
O'Connell, Mr. Daniel, anecdotes of, 10,
160; family of, 24-25.
(junior), 152.
John, 25.
Morgan, 24.
Philip, anecdote of, 48.
Mrs., 78.
Sir James, 25-26.
O'Connor, Father M., 92.
Fergus, anecdote of, 76.
Mr. T. P., 62.
O'Conor Don, the, 270.
O'Donnell f . the Times, 274.
O'Donoghue, Rev. Denis, 96.
the, 221 ; election of, 98-99.
O'Hagan, Lord, 89.
Oliver, Colonel, 199.
Ormsby, Judge, 82, 83.
O'Shaughnessy, Mr., 273.
O'Shea, Daniel, 210, 255.
O'Sullivan, James, 245.
Palmer, Mr., 294.
Parliament, Irish Members of, 194 et seq.
Parnell Commission, 68, 104, 275-280.
Mr., fenian leadership of, 65, 1565
Lord Carnarvon and, 167; Land League
and, 195, 202,216; speech quoted on
boycotting, 249.
Parnellism and crime, 275.
Peel, Sir Robert, 51, 76.
(the younger), 169.
Pembroke, Earl of, 271.
Phoenix Park murder, the, 252.
Society, the, 65.
Pigott, Richard, 275-276.
Pitt, Mr. William, 180.
Plunkett, Mr. T. O., 222.
Sir Horace^ 161.
Price, Professor Bohnamy, 268.
Protection, Mr. Hussey on, 297-299.
Puck Fair, 95, 104-105.
Punchestown, 296.
Quill, Patrick, 273.
Ray, Mr. Jack, anecdote of, 154-155.
Regium Donum, Presbyterian grant, 180.
Reld, Mr., 277.
Sir Wemyss, 171, 211.
Reynolds, Alderman John, 75-76.
John, 245.
Richmond and Gordon, Duke of, 204, 268.
Roberts, Earl, 157.
Roche, Mr. R., 240.
Roden, Lord, 163.
Ronayne, Mr. Joseph, M.P. for Cork, 46.
Rosebery, Earl of, 171.
Ross, Judge, 41.
Rossa, O'Donovan, 65.
Rossbeigh, Land League at, 266.
Royal Commission on Agriculture, 204.
Russell, Lord John, 51, 163.
Sir Charles, 276-277.
Sadler, Colonel, 4.
Saint Alban's, Holborn, Church of, 122.
Saint Anne's, Soho, Church of, 34.
Saint James's Club, 57.
Salisbury, Lord, Commission on Land Act
of 1881, 271.
Sandes, Mr., 97.
Savings Banks, increase of deposits, 191.
Saxe, Marshal, anecdote of, 62-63.
Schoolmasters, appointment of, 133.
Scottish character, 35-36.
Scully, Mr., 94.
Sexton, Mr., 222.
Shaftesbury, Lord, 122.
Shanahan, Robert, 151.
Thomas, 245.
Shaw, Mr., 270.
Sheehan, Mr., 252.
Sheehy, Father, 252.
Shiel, Sir George, 122.
Smerwick Harbour, 2.
Smith, Mr. Charles, historian, 2, 6.
Sidney, 136.
Somerville, Miss, 30.
312 REMINISCENCES OF AN IRISH LAND AGENT
Spencer, Lord, anecdote of, 166-167 ; Land
Act, opinion on, 203 ; Coercion Act,
opinion on, 225.
Spiddal, 137.
Standford, Mr., 99.
Stansfield, Lord, 204.
Star newspaper, 275.
Stephen, Sir James, quoted, 250-251.
Stevens, Captain, no.
Stephens, James, ' Number One,' 65, 68, 156.
Stuart, Mr., 258.
SulHvan, Sir Edward, 166.
Sunday Democrat newspaper, 255.
Tanner, Dr., 112.
Thackeray, William Makepeace, 78.
Thorneycroft, Colonel, 16.
Times newspaper, the —
Edenburn outrage, on the, 239, 242-243.
Encumbered Estate Act, quoted on, 71.
Mr. Hussey's letter to, on land values,
259 J Lord Kenmare's estate, 221.
O'Donnell -v., 274-275.
Parnell Commission, Mr. Hussey's evi-
dence before, 276-280.
Traill, Dr. Anthony, 272.
Tralee, drink traffic in, 113.
County Club, 97, in, 242.
Trant family, the, 107.
Trench, Mr. Steuart, famine described by,
50-51-
Townshend, 17, 277.
Trevelyan, Sir George, 174-175.
Trinity College, Dublin, 117.
Tucker, Sir Charles, 157.
Tulla, outrage at, 171, 216.
Tullamore, Mr. Forster's speech at, 216.
Tweedmouth, Lord, 167.
Tynan, 'Number One,' 65, 156.
Union Club, 246.
United Ireland newsY>a.per, 244, 249, 251.
University, Roman Catholic, for Ireland,
Mr. Hussey's opinion regarding, 116-117.
Ventry Harbour, 2, 4.
Lady, famine, help in, 53, 54.
■ Lord, 46.
Wallace, Mr. Paul, 48.
Walsh, Dr., Archbishop of Dublin, 118.
Wellington, Duke of, 157, 163.
White, Mr. Richard, of Inchiclogh, 55.
Sir George, 157.
Whiteboys, 14, 61-62.
Whiteside, Chief Justice, 89.
Wilde, Lady, ' Speranza,' 63.
Oscar, 63.
Winn, Mr., 255.
Wolseley, Lord, 157, 283.
Wrench, Mr., 274.
Wright, Mr. Huntley, quoted, 101.
' Wuffalo Will,' 64.
Wyndham, Mr., 58, 129.
York, Duke of, 173.
Youghal, 193.
Young Ireland Party, 63.
Mr., 99.
Zetland, Earl of, 168.
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